This is the writer's voice, new fiction from The New Yorker.

I'm Deborah Treesman, fiction editor at The New Yorker.

On this episode of The Writer's Voice, we'll hear Camille Bordas read her story,

Understanding the Science, from the December 15th, 2025 issue of the magazine.

Bordas is the author of four novels, including How to Behave in a Crowd and The Material.

Her first story collection, One Sun Only, will be published in January.

Now here's Camille Fordas.

Understanding the Science.

Everyone thinks they're on this big journey now, Debbie said, refilling her glass.

I've had it with the journey. I've had it with you people.

I don't think I'm on a journey, Bert said. Self-discovery, Debbie added. What a joke. Life's too

short to find out who we really are. It was the first time the six of them had got together for dinner

in more than a year, since Maria's diagnosis.

And after such a long time, and in celebration of Maria's remission,

they'd expected to have more interesting things to tell one another, deeper things,

but they were entering dessert territory now. A cake was on the table.

And only superficial topics had been broached.

Irvin's promotion, Jane and Burt's move to the suburbs,

Catherine's recent purchase of a metabolism tracking device,

a pen-shaped item and the cause of Debbie's rent.

How much can you know about yourself exactly, she said?

The therapy, the vision quests, the birth charts.

...