We’re sharing a bonus blog post in between our semi-regular Alumni Updates to help celebrate some good news: A pair of former contributors were in the national spotlight this month.
Nicole Piasecki Essay on This American Life
If you’re a fan of storytelling, you’re likely a fan of This American Life, a long-running public radio program (and podcast) with a reach of more than 3.5 million.
Hearing Ira Glass introduce a writer and essay published in Hippocampus Magazine was a major goosebump moment for us, so we can’t imagine how meaningful this milestone was for Nicole Piasecki.
Episode 838: “Letters! Actual Letters!” aired on August 16, 2024. After a prologue featuring a walk with a letter carrier, we move into Act 1, in which Nicole read an updated version of her moving Hippocampus essay “Maybe We Can Make a Circle,” which we published** back in June 2017.
We’re incredibly proud of this beautiful and tragic essay — and of Nicole for her courageous writing and sharing. And this is a testament to how a lit mag publication can lead to unexpected surprises and continued success.
Listen (or read the transcript) Here.
**Additional note from Donna: I wanted to go back to see the reading panel members assigned to this story in ‘17 so that I could be sure to send them an update about this essay’s new honor. In doing so, I was also reminded that this was basically a unanimous HELL YEAH. Here are a few comments from that team:
- “I really liked the way the narrator slowly unspooled this tragic story”
- “This is a very strong essay. I like the way the narrator tries to make sense of what happened and keeps interrogating the wife of the killer….”
- “I have read a lot of essays for Hippo and this one is far and away the best! … [the numbers] allow for a fast pace, a chronological sequence with no need for transitions between moments in this incredible timeline of events. Really, really well written.”
- “Oh wow. This is heartbreaking and a strong story.”
No wonder Ira and the team fell for it, too.
Paul Rousseau Memoir Excerpt in Newsweek
Former contributor Paul Rousseau had an excerpt of his forthcoming memoir, Friendly Fire: A Fracture Memoir, published in Newsweek on August 22, 2024. Read “Mark Was My Best Friend. He Shot Me in the Head” here.
Another excerpt of that memoir (in an earlier-version) appeared in Hippocampus in May 2021, and we nominated it for that year’s Pushcart Prize: “Curiously Colored & Timely Animals + Other Things Forgotten Post Surgery.”
This is especially timely as we’re excited to welcome Paul to our next Stories on Sunday, on 9/8. Learn more here.
After Hippocampus: More Post-Publication Achievements
We keep a running list of recognition, reprints, book projects, and other honors like these for work originally published in Hippocampus Magazine. Check them out here. [And let us know if we missed something!]
Many congratulations!