Contributors

Skip Hollandsworth

Skip Hollandsworth's Profile Photo

Skip Hollandsworth is a staff writer at Texas Monthly specializing in longform narratives. He grew up in Wichita Falls, attended TCU in Fort Worth, and after graduation worked as a reporter and columnist for newspapers in Dallas. He also worked as a television producer and documentary filmmaker.

In 1989, Hollandsworth joined Texas Monthly, where he has received several journalism awards, including a National Headliner Award, the national John Hancock Award for excellence in business and financial journalism, the City and Regional Magazine Association gold award for feature writing, and the Texas Institute of Letters O. Henry Award for magazine writing. He has been a finalist four times for a National Magazine Award, the magazine industry’s equivalent of the Pulitzer Prize, and in 2010 he won the National Magazine Award in feature writing for “Still Life,” his story about a young man who, after suffering a crippling football injury in high school, spent the next 33 years in his bedroom, unable to move. The comic crime movie Bernie, which Hollandsworth cowrote with director Richard Linklater, was released in May 2012. It’s based on Hollandsworth’s 1998 story “Midnight in the Garden of East Texas.” His book, The Midnight Assassin, a true-crime historical thriller, was published in April 2016 and became a New York Times best-seller.

304 Articles

True Crime|
March 22, 2017

The Wild Bunch

Two years after a deadly Waco shoot-out, the local district attorney is trying to take down the Bandidos and Cossacks biker clubs. It won’t be easy.

Books|
June 22, 2016

The Minor Regional Novelist

Texas may have inspired Larry McMurtry to become a writer, but there is no writer who has inspired an understanding of Texas quite like Larry McMurtry. At age eighty, our most iconic author still has work to do.

Arts & Entertainment|
April 4, 2016

Murders in the Night

An exclusive excerpt from The Midnight Assassin: Panic, Scandal, and the Hunt for America's First Serial Killer reveals a forgotten time in Austin history, when a series of brutal, unsolved slayings terrified officials and left them wondering if a madman was on the loose.

Sports|
August 13, 2015

Mega Watt

He’s the best defensive player in the NFL but writes his own Christmas cards. He has thousands of fans who’d love to party, but he goes to bed at seven-thirty. He could be the league’s next MVP but enjoys buying his own groceries. Is Houston’s J. J. Watt for real?

The Culture|
March 23, 2015

How to Survive the Summer

When I was a teenager growing up in Wichita Falls, which is regularly hailed as one of the hottest cities in the state (and sometimes the country), I spent my summers smelling like roadkill. The moment I stepped outside my house, sweat began sliding like syrup down my back.

True Crime|
October 21, 2014

A Shooting on Spring Grove Avenue

Olivia Lord told Dallas police officers that her boyfriend put a gun to his head after a drunken argument. Detective Dwayne Thompson couldn’t see how the evidence—or motive—made any sense. How did Michael Burnside die on May 9, 2010?

Update|
January 25, 2014

Bernie Returns!

Bernie Tiede, the Carthage man whose story of shooting the town's richest widow inspired a movie, may be walking free next week.

SCANDALS|
April 10, 2013

Darkness on the Plains

For decades, Stanley Marsh 3 was one of the most celebrated eccentrics in Texas. Then one Houston attorney set out to prove that he had a dark and terrible secret.

Sports|
March 11, 2013

Hoop Queens

Half a century ago, the women’s basketball team at Wayland Baptist College set an extraordinary record that may never be broken: the longest winning streak in sports history.

Dallas|
January 23, 2013

By Invitation Only

In a city that loves its parties, there’s perhaps none so aesthetically significant as Two x Two for AIDS and Art, Dallas’s most cutting-edge fundraiser—and one hell of a good time.

The Culture|
January 21, 2013

I Shall Never Surrender or Retreat . . .

. . . from teaching my fifteen-year-old daughter about her Texas roots. So when I realized I was failing to accomplish this most sacred of duties, I did what any well-meaning parent would do: loaded her (and her friends, of course) into the car and hit the road.

Feature|
January 21, 2013

School Of Pop

To Addison they come, tweens and teens with talent in abundance, so Linda Septien can teach them how to be the next big thing. Jessica Simpson is her most famous success story, but there are many others. And more in the making.

Film & TV|
January 21, 2013

Lights, Camera, Carthage!

Nearly fifteen years after Richard Linklater and I started talking about turning a Texas Monthly story into a major motion picture, it’s finally hitting the big screen, with a little help from Jack Black, Matthew McConaughey, Shirley MacLaine—and a seventy-year-old retired hairdresser from Rusk named Kay Baby Epperson.

Reporter|
January 21, 2013

Sects With Strangers

Have you heard the one about the Mormon polygamists who descended on a tiny West Texas town? It would be funny if it wasn't so serious. (Okay, it's pretty funny too.)

Business|
January 20, 2013

Store Wars!

Two luxury retailers: Neiman Marcus and Saks Fifth Avenue. One desirable market: Houston. The fight for the hearts and credit cards of couture clotheshorses like Lynn Wyatt and Carolyn Farb officially begins next month, but already the fur is flying.

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