Hazel Edwards has a cake-eating hippo on her roof, an OAM for literature, and thousands of book-children-as well as a real family. Plus the Hazelnuts she has mentored and a readership in 13 languages. Using 'anecdultery', which is Hazel's term for story-telling, she explains where her ideas come from and why writing long-term is mentally risky but culturally vital and contributes to a non-boring life. The hippocampus is where memories are kept-even those from Nepal to Antarctica, where Hazel was an expeditioner. Now Hazel's hippocampus is overflowing. Her stories have given adult fans and child readers diverse insights into other worlds, both fact and fiction. She is now sharing the creative process of her quest and the quandary of how much to reveal. (OAM is not for Hippo as an Outsized, Awesome Myth.)