Jake Halpern, a contributor to This American Life, has written for The New Yorker and The New York Times Magazine. His latest book is Bad Paper: Chasing Debt from Wall Street to the Underworld. "I test out my stories on my kids. You should be able to tell any story, now matter how complicated, to a seven-year-old in a way that they understand. If you can't, that probably means that either a) you're telling the story wrong or b) it's not really a story." Thanks to TinyLetter and Bonobos for sponsoring this week's episode. Show Notes: jakehalpern.com Halpern on Longform [2:00] "The Devil Underground" (Nadja Drost • The Atavist • Oct 2014) [2:00] Longform App Exclusive: "The Trials of White Boy Rick" (Evan Hughes • The Atavist • Sep 2014) [3:00] Braving Home (Houghton Mifflin • 2003) [4:00] "Jungle Boy" (The New Republic • 2006) [14:00] Fame Junkies (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt • 2006) [14:00] Bad Paper (Farrar, Straus and Giroux • 2014) [17:00] "Selling the Beat" (New Yorker • Apr 2004) [21:00] "Pay Up" (New Yorker • Oct 2004) [43:00] "Paper Boys" (New York Times Magazine • Aug 2014) [43:00] "Magic Words" (This American Life • Aug 2014) [43:00] "Bad Paper, The Debtor Game" (Fusion • Aug 2014) [45:00] The Dormia Trilogy [46:00] "The Secret of the Temple" (The New Yorker • Apr 2012) [51:00] "Switched at Birth" (This American Life • Jul 2008) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices