HippoCamp 2022 was an incredible success. After a year off, we cautiously returned in 2021 and it was a fantastic year, albeit with a lot of smiling behind masks. This August (12-14), our summer creative writing conference made an even stronger comeback with more than 230 attendees from 35+ states and three countries (including three Canadian provinces).
On this page, we provide a quick overview of some recaps and resources, as well as brief information about HippoCamp 2023. Thank you, again, to all of our speakers, volunteers, magazine staff members, and attendees!
SESSION RECAPS
In this section we'll share speaker-provided resources, such as slide decks and handouts, as well as recap posts from our volunteer blogging team:
Session Slides & Handouts
The following sessions have slide decks and/or handouts available (downloads available on session pages linked here, listed in alphabetical order by last name):
- Julie Artz/Suzette Mullen: Is Your Manuscript Ready to Pitch? Your Query Audit Toolkit
- Brandon Arvesen (Flash): Fact-Checking the Family Story
- Karen Carnabucci: Writing About Trauma to Heal Ourselves and Others
- Sheela Clary: What A Grocery Store Clerk Taught Me About The Art of the Interview
- Jackie Domenus: The Power in "You": Experimenting with 2nd Person POV in CNF
- Carole Duff: Becoming a Writer in the Third Chapter of Life
- Amy Eaton: Have I Got a Story For You! How to Find Live Outlets For Your Work or Create Them Yourself
- Lisa Cooper Ellison: To Prologue or Not to Prologue, that is the Question
- Lillie Gardner: Write Like a Musician
- Diane Gottlieb: The "I" in Narrative Nonfiction: How to Tell Others' Stories without Taking Over or Getting in the Way
- Jill Kolongowski/Amy Monticello: On the Daily: Finding Magic in the Minutia
- Lindsey DeLoach Jones: The Writers Notebook: How 3 Dollars and A Simple Daily Practice Can Deepen Your Craft and Career
- Dawn Leas (Flash): Getting Unstuck: Three Paths to Free-flowing Words
- Nina B. Lichtenstein: Writing the Body: How to Mine Your Treasure Chest for Memories
- Lara Lillibridge: Let the Fragments Be Enough: An Exploration of the Segmented Essay & Micro-Memoir
- Janna Marlies Maron/Margaret Whitford: Just Tell Me What To Do: A Case Study of a Writer-Editor Collaboration
- Vicki Mayk (Flash): Read Any Good Books Lately? The Art of the Book Review
- Amy Monticello/Jill Kolongowski: see Kolongowski, above
- Suzette Mullen/Julie Artz: see Artz, above
- Ruth Nasrullah: A Sacred Trust: Getting it Right When Writing About Religion
- Randon Billings Noble: The Long and Winding Road: Publishing an Essay Collection
- Kristen Paulson-Nguyen: The Answer Is in Your Essay: Creating a Title that Stands Out
- Sue Repko: Diving into the Wreck: How to Write the Hard Parts, Come Up for Air and Self-Care, and Finish Your Memoir
- Dorothy Rice: Have a Great Story? Find the Right Narrative Engine to Jumpstart it and Keep it Moving
- Stacie Walton (w/ guest Linda Goodrich): Recognizing and Reducing Implicit Bias in Your Writing
- Margaret Whitford/Janne Marlies Maron: see Maron, above
Recap Blog Posts
Thanks to our attendees for volunteering to cover and capture HippoCamp content via the following guest blog posts (view all conference blog content here):
- Do the (Writer's) Hustle: A HippoCamp Recap on Gentle Networking Tips for Writers (Denise Bike)
- A Fragment Is Its Own Thing: A HippoCamp Recap on Segmented Essay and Micro-Memoir (Denise Bike)
- 10 Book Publishing Myths (with Lawrence Knorr): A HippoCamp Recap (Carole Duff)
- It Takes Discipline to Write Like a Musician: A HippoCamp Recap (Carole Duff)
- The Road to Publication is Long and Winding (with Randon Billings Noble): HippoCamp Recap (Carole Duff)
- Empathy Over Agreement: Ruth Nasrullah Shows Us How to “Get It Right” When Writing About Religion (Jennifer Furner)
- Humor's Role in Creative Nonfiction (with Maryann Aita): A HippoCamp 2022 Recap (Lillie Gardner)
- HippoCamp 2022 Recap: Sue Repko's Advice for Diving into the Wreck (Lillie Gardner)
- Beware of Implicit Bias in Writing: A HippoCamp 2022 Recap (Lillie Gardner)
- HippoCamp Recap: Using Mindfulness to Quiet the Inner Critic with Lisa Jakub (Roberta Holland)
- HippoCamp Recap: This Way Out with Kelly Caldwell (Roberta Holland)
- The Essence of Being Grounded: A HippoCamp Recap of Writing About Trauma to Heal Ourselves and Others (Trish McDonald)
- The Art of Writing a Book Review by Vicki Mayk – A HippoCamp 2022 Recap (Angie Mohn)
- Getting Unstuck: Insight into Finding Words with Dawn Leas – A HippoCamp 2022 Recap (Angie Mohn)
- Why Write Child Narrators? Jeannine Ouellette has the Answers: A 2022 HippoCamp Recap (Heidi Fettig Parton)
- On Finding Essay Titles: The Answer Is in Your Essay: A HippoCamp Recap (Jaminnia R. States)
- Drafting your First Drafts Club: A HippoCamp Recap (Jaminnia R. States)
- Taking 3rd Place in My First Story Slam (Molly Bilinski, on the HippoCamp Story Slam)
ATTENDEE & SPEAKER CONTENT - Blog Posts, Podcasts, Social Posts & More
A few attendees and speakers turned their HippoCamp experience into blog posts, Twitter threads, articles, and more.
- “Get Thee to a Writers' Conference … and S T R E T C H” - by attendee Michèle Dawson Haber for the Brevity Blog.
- “My HippoCamp Weekend” by presenter and first-time attendee James Irwin
- “HippoCamp22!” by presenter/attendee Sue Repko
- “Outside my Comfort Zone” by first-time attendee Xavier Trevino
The Backchannel: Social Media Mentions & Convos
- The #HippoCamp22 Twitter feed - link goes to a live search for the hashtag
- (and there was also some hashtag action using #HippoCamp2022)
- The #HippoCamp22 Instagram feed
HIPPOCAMP MERCH & BOOKS
Show your HippoCamp spirit or support our speakers.
Get HippoCamp Merch: Shirts Still Available
We partnered with Threadless Artist Shops to offer a range of styles, fabrics, and colors of HippoCamp apparel, including tees and tanks. These shirts aren't dated, but instead are evergreen with the year we were founded – and they're print-on-demand, made JUST for you.
Miss a Book at the Book Sale (or Didn't Attend)?
Hippocampus Magazine is a BookShop.org affiliate. We made a special list of speaker books. Hippocampus Magazine is a BookShop.org affiliate. We made a special list of speaker books. You can browse titles here by 2022 and previous-year speakers.
LOOKING AHEAD: HippoCamp 2023 Information
Save the dates: Aug. 11-13, 2023; our call for session proposals opens Oct. 3, 2023. The conference website will go live in early 2023. (The Conference page of the main Hippocampus Magazine website will house links to the most up-to-date conference details.)