The Reader has started this series of its best stories from the past 52 years — 2600 cover stories and some remarkable interior features — to help make up for the loss of its physical …
December 5, 2025
Articles by Steven Shepherd
A castrated man in San Diego
From the Pt. Loma Women's Club to the Spirit on Buenos
He brought punk rock to San Diego The patrons heading into the Spirit club shortly before nine on a recent Saturday night might have thought it peculiar that a large, paint-splattered wooden stepladder would be …
June 26, 2023
Castrated San Diegans
Life as a castrated man There was one psychological change that can be attributed solely to his new shortage of testosterone. He lost his interest in sex. It wasn’t dramatic, says Tom. Rather, he simply …
August 6, 2022
Wahrenbrock's Book House, Chino's vegetables
A Long Shelf Life Valverde unburdens a perspiring white-haired man loaded from waist to double chin with titles about World War II. He says to Valverde, I'm just kinda reminiscing about my war.” Waiting in …
February 12, 2022
Sole survivor of fishing accident, the bitch of being 5'5", tried Morningstar for my schizophrenia
Nightmare of the New Hope A little cry of relief burst from him, lost in the shriek of the wind. His hands scrambled, searching for the inflate cord. The sea bounced him. Spray lashed the …
October 2, 2021
Army-Navy Academy, wine experts behind doors, castrated man's life
An unhampered look at Carlsbad's Army Navy Academy "Unlike the upper-school cadets, these boys will break down and cry, a lot. They don’t want other boys to see ’em cry, ’cause it’s not macho. But …
August 29, 2021
Best Reader stories from 1981
Postcards From Western Civilization Some years ago at Christmastime, when I was a teller at a bank downtown, I came to know Wayne Boyer, who was then an apprentice bum. I met him in the …
November 23, 2019
San Diego in the '50s and '60s
The Polio YearsI began to wonder whether I would just be a cripple the rest of my life or permanently stretched out in an iron lung. While I lay moaning in the back seat on …
July 30, 2017
Maple Street sewer repair, part two
March 21,1997(Friday, 7a.m. to 3p.m.) ... and including, The Tale of the Palm (Act II): The Fiat is not to be seen when first I peek this morning, it remains in the driveway and the …
March 19, 1998