Sonya Huber, author of seven books — including the essay collection Pain Woman Takes Your Keys and Other Essays from a Nervous System, Supremely Tiny Acts: A Memoir in a Day, and the forthcoming Voice First: A Writer’s Manifesto (which we cannot wait to get our hands on!) — will join us for her second HippoCamp this year. She was kind enough to answer a few questions about her upcoming trip to Lancaster for our annual writing conference:
***
Q: Tell us a little about your involvement this year at HippoCamp.
A: I’m excited to run a pre-conference workshop on narration and voice, which will give attendees a chance to look for voice variation and to see how we can contain a multiplicity of voices even in nonfiction. I’m also excited to see friends and enjoy HippoCamp for the second time!
Q: Our motto is “memorable creative nonfiction.” Tell us about one of the more recent memoirs, essay collections, or individual essays you’ve read and why it was memorable.
A: I adored reading my friend Jill Christman’s forthcoming essay collection, If This Were Fiction: A Love Story in Essays, which manages to be both a memoir and a book in which each essay can stand on its own. Jill offers such beautiful inspiration for writers of all levels.
Q: What made you decide to participate in HippoCamp this year as a speaker? If you’re a returning speaker, how did your past experiences encourage to want to come back?
A: HippoCamp is unique among the conferences I’ve attended over two decades; there’s such care in creating opportunities to talk, and a real appreciation for our nonfiction community. I miss my people, and larger conferences end up feeling too frantic to really connect with friends.
Q: What’s going to keep you busy between now and HippoCamp?
A: Getting my son ready for college and writing about John McPhee!
Q: Since you’ll also be attending the conference, when you’re not wearing your “speaker hat,” what are you most looking forward to learning or doing?
A: I’m interested in Jill Kolongowski’s and Amy Monticello’s panel on Dailiness and I’m excited to get inspiration for new writing projects.
Q: We love introducing Lancaster to attendees. Since you’ve been here before, what would you recommend to other attendees? And, what are you looking forward to?
A: The amazing food market downtown.
***
We can’t wait for Sonya to join us this year! HippoCamp 2022, a creative nonfiction conference sponsored by Hippocampus Magazine and Books, is Aug. 12-14 in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. For more information or to register, visit our official conference website here.
(Learn more about the conference and see details of all previous years at our magazine website’s HippoCamp page.)
