Garfield County Libraries are encouraging residents to put pen to paper this November with a new local program designed to keep writers motivated.

National Novel Writing Month, widely known as NaNoWriMo, traditionally challenges participants to write 50,000 words in 30 days — about 1,700 words daily. But with the official NaNoWriMo platform no longer active, the library district is stepping in with its own version: Garfield County Writing Month.

“We started doing it because NaNoWriMo has disbanded,” said Trary LaMee, adult services coordinator for the Glenwood Springs Branch. “The entire platform has been canceled and it left a void.”

The Glenwood Springs Branch has an active writing group that looks forward to November.

“Writing is such a lonely business,” LaMee said. “So we’re going for it.”

LaMee said that while NaNoWriMo has mostly been for people writing novels, they’ve decided to invite more types of writers. 

“Because we were able to create the program on our own terms, we decided to invite everyone and every kind of writing,” LaMee said. “Students with essays, people writing letters, children writing stories.”

Some people in the regular group are close to completing a novel.

“We try to touch on most genres with our speaker series,” LaMee said. “Our idea was to inspire and have people sit down and write, no matter what it is they want to write.” From 5-8 p.m.

Tuesdays, different presentations from authors and people from the publishing industry – Nate White, who won the Colorado Book Award, talking inspiration and creativity with Jessica Barnum, a local teacher and author, Shelly Merriam, who will be talking about memoir writing, and learning about the editing and publishing world with Kristin Carlsoni.

From 6-8 p.m., Thursdays, there are writing collaboration spaces. Writing warmups will be followed by round robin talking with other writers to get feedback on your work. There will then be dedicated writing time, to take the critique and do what you need to. 

From 5-7:30 p.m., Dec. 4, there will be a party to celebrate the end of November’s grueling writing, but continue working on your piece if you need – these are only guidelines.