Contributors

Sonia Smith

Sonia Smith's Profile Photo

A native of Houston and a graduate of Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service, Sonia Smith is a writer-at-large for Texas Monthly. She cut her teeth reporting on crime on the bayou for the Baton Rouge Advocate. She has also written for Slate, The New York Times Magazine, Roads & Kingdoms, and the Kyiv Post, and was a finalist for the 2008 Livingston Awards for Young Journalists for her reporting on sexual abuse at the Louisiana School for the Deaf. Her Texas Monthly profile of leading climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe was included in the anthology The Best American Science and Nature Writing 2017.

683 Articles

Politics & Policy|
May 1, 2014

A Mayor of Many Worlds

Born in Pakistan and raised in Abu Dhabi, the mayor of Paris, Texas, Dr. Arjumand Hashmi, tackles city business in between patient visits and holds the distinction of making the small East Texas city a medical destination for former Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf.

By
Belief|
March 5, 2014

The Younger Years of the Church Elders

Sean Morris and Ryan Ringnald, both in their late twenties, are leaders of the conservative, 90-person Church of Wells, which many consider to be a cult. This doesn't come as a surprise to a number of peers who knew them during their college years at Baylor.

By
Television|
February 23, 2014

Let’s Discuss “Downton”

"Manor of Speaking" unpacks each new episode of the critically-acclaimed Masterpiece Classic series and has quickly become Houston PBS's most popular locally-produced show.

By
Notorious M.G.B.|
January 23, 2014

A Glimpse Into Michael Brown’s Collection of Oddities

Hundreds of people pawed through an extensive collection of guns and taxidermied animals owned by the infamous hand surgeon, who killed himself last year. It was just another spectacle in the long-running circus that defined Brown's life—and death.

By
Religion|
January 10, 2014

Sinners in the Hands

Twenty-seven-year-old Catherine Grove is a member of a small, insular, and eccentric church in East Texas. Her parents think she’s being brainwashed. She insists she’s being saved.

By
Travel & Outdoors|
January 9, 2014

Afraid of Losing the Dark

The McDonald Observatory, celebrating its seventy-fifth anniversary this year, forges ahead with groundbreaking research and crusades to keep the night skies of West Texas pristine and unadulterated.

By
BOOKS|
October 22, 2013

Wandering Oswald

An interview with Peter Savodnik, author of "The Interloper: Lee Harvey Oswald Inside the Soviet Union."

By
Agriculture|
October 17, 2013

Kids for Sale

For the last several centuries, Texas was cattle country. Now, with worldwide demand for goat meat growing, and drought threatening to put cattle ranchers out of business, should Texas be goat country?

By
The Daily Post|
October 10, 2013

Tattooed Jesus Billboards Flood Lubbock

Lubbock, long a stronghold in the Bible Belt, is home to a new religious marketing campaign featuring a tattooed Jesus. The billboards picturing inked Jesus have irked some in the community (where churches outnumber tattoo parlors 25:1) and left others impressed with the message.

By
Politics & Policy|
June 19, 2013

Special Procedures

Katy Republican Senator Glenn Hegar combined measures that failed to pass during the regular session into an omnibus abortion bill that won approval in the state Senate late Tuesday night.

By
Politics & Policy|
April 3, 2013

CSCOPE Under the Microscope

The Senate Education Committee heard four hours of testimony Tuesday on a bill by Senator Dan Patrick that would require the State Board of Education to sign off on all lesson plans included in the online curriculum management tool CSCOPE.

By
Magazine Latest