Advice on making that toughest call

One of the toughest calls journalists have to make is to interview the family of someone who just died. During war, more of us need to make those calls. Chip Scanlan offers good advice from two veteran reporters in "Calls of Last Resort: Remembering Today's War Dead."

I share some observations on reporting on grief and on getting the facts right in this column.

The Nieman Watchdog report has lots of interesting reading that I recommend:

Speaking of Nieman, I recently called your attention in one of these notes to the Nieman Narrative Digest, attributing the commentary on some of the pieces to Mark Kramer, director of the Nieman Program on Narrative Journalism. I thought I recognized Mark's voice in the commentary that I read and assumed (not a reporting technique I recommend) they were his work. Mark corrects me: "Most of the blurbs are not by me but by the site's discerning editor, Nell Lake. I contribute to some of them, but Nell's the blurbista and she's got a knack for being discerning and somehow, positive and frank at the same time."