Write with the Mighty Pens!

And join an entire community of like-minded writers AND win epic prizes!

Before I dive into this post about the Mighty Pens and our mission for charitable giving and writing, I want to first check in with all of you: how are you doing right now?

Second, I want to direct you all to Doctors Without Borders, who is providing desperately needed medical supplies in the Israel-Hamas war. After the Al Ahli Arab hospital bombing, such care and supplies are even more necessary.

Please consider donating. Even a tiny amount can make a huge difference.

Also please consider that I wrote all of my posts for October before this conflict began. I’m going to stick to my scheduled posts because that’s one of the (frankly) shitty parts of being an author: my livelihood depends on promoting my work.

Anyway. Please donate to Doctors Without Borders. Or Islamic Relief USA is another fantastic charity I’ve supported (and worked with directly) for many years.

Now onto the primary charitable work that has taken up my 2023.

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The Mighty Pens

With NaNoWriMo only 12 days away (!) and the Mighty Pens kicking off on day 1, I thought I’d try to entice all you awesome writers to join us.

We have so many amazing prizes you can earn this year. Like, I am blown away by the generosity of our publishing community. Ranging from critiques to video chats to signed books to free workshops, we have something for all you writers out there.

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So who are we?

The Mighty Pens a charitable, volunteer-run group of writers that I cofounded with Kat Brauer in 2017. Each year we pick a new charity, and during NaNoWriMo, we write words to raise money.

Sort of like how runners will get sponsors for each mile in a marathon, we instead get sponsors for each word written.¹ We ask friends, families, colleagues to donate money based on how many words we write during NaNoWriMo.

Since 2017, we have raised over $40,000 for different charities, including the Malala Fund and Every Mother Counts. Plus, we’ve collectively written millions upon millions of words!

This year, we’re raising money for We Need Diverse Books, a 501(c)(3) non-profit and a grassroots organization of children’s book lovers. They advocate for essential changes in the publishing industry, to produce and promote literature that reflects and honors the lives of all young people.

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Wait, what about these prizes you mentioned?

Oh yeah, when you hit certain fundraising tiers, you gain access to different prizes! There are four tiers: $50, $100, $250, and $500.

We have giant critique packages from editors and agents and authors. We have smaller critique packages, we have chapter critiques, we have signed books, we have swag, we have free workshops, we have noise-cancelling headphones, a custom-made planner—so many things for all you writers out there!

You can see all the prizes we have so far here!

And we have word count tiers too! At 10,000 words, 30,000 words, and 50,000 words, you automatically win prizes from ME such as an annual pass to this Substack or free access to my upcoming Academy!

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Be part of our active community!

NaNoWriMo already has a fantastic community that has grown up around it, and we at the Mighty Pens have taken that up a few more notches. We have writing sprints, sharing sessions, brainstorming meet-ups, movie nights, and more! Our Discord server is super active, and our writers are truly some of the most welcoming, generous humans out there.

Because of course we are! We’re all driven to write words and help the world—including help each other. 🥰 As such, our community is just a lovely, warm, happy place to be.²

Of course, participation and interaction are entirely up to you and your comfort level. There are plenty of lurkers, including myself most days. 😅

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Work on your novel and put more goodness in the world!

While we all vary in how much money we’re able to raise, there is no doubt that every dollar helps—and every word written makes our world a better, more diverse place.

I always set low goals for my writing because I find it far less intimidating than the 50,000 word goal of NaNo. But that is part of the fun—there’s no “right” goal to set and no “right” amount of money to raise. Some of us don’t even write during November! Instead we edit or brainstorm or code. The fun is in the community and knowing you’re putting so much goodness out into the world.

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Book banning and the power of words

Many of our educators and librarians are faced daily with book banning challenges. Their jobs are at risk, and sometimes even their lives are at risk as the banning rhetoric reaches dangerous heights.

I know many librarians and teachers who are faced daily with an onslaught of ignorant, false, and at times violent calls for banning of books.

We Need Diverse Books—and the Mighty Pens alongside them—are committed to fighting these bans and to providing teachers, librarians, parents, and allies with the tools to protect diverse voices in literature.

Our goal is to raise at least $10,000 this year through the Mighty Pens, which WNDB will use to fight book banning and to protect our libraries and classrooms.

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I hope some of you will consider joining us this November! You can sign up here! Or, if you’re an industry pro who wants to donate to our prize list, you can do that here.

Thank you for reading, and as always, thank you for supporting! The more we write, the more we raise! 💪

1. Isn’t that just the cleverest?! It was Kat’s idea, and she came to me hoping I would help her build it back in 2017. We’d done charitable work together in the past, so I was immediately all in. And it was so successful that year, that we’ve just kept doing it every year since! Kat is an amazing partner who puts so much brilliance and joy into the world. I’m lucky to have called her friend for the last 12 years.

2. Also, huge shoutout to our volunteers! And a special extra shoutout to Abigail and Kaite, on our admin team. They have done SO MUCH behind the scenes this year to get us ready for our campaign in November. From tech to graphics to outreach, thank you!!