Chris Baty on the Magic of a Goal and a Deadline

Memoir Nation: Weekly Inspiration for Writers is an extension of the Memoir Nation community hosted by Brooke Warner and Grant Faulkner, two friends and colleagues who bring a community-minded sensibility to the writing journey. Originally launched as Write-minded in 2018, this is a weekly writing podcast that focuses on memoir and personal writing, as well as industry trends and tips and resources for writers and authors.

Through the month of December, Memoir Nation podcast is hosting a series called JanYourStory Prep to get listeners ready and excited to participate in our January writing challenge to write 500 words a day every day in January. Inspired by Grant’s 12 years as Executive Director of NaNoWriMo, JanYourStory is for memoirists, but anyone can join this free challenge. Instead of writing 60K words in November as was the case with NaNoWriMo, we’re inviting writers to write 15K words in January. Many of the principles and values of NaNoWriMo are buoying this event, which is why we’re so grateful to have the blessing, support, and wisdom of Chris Baty, who joins the show this week to talk about why writing challenges are helpful and should always be grounded in fun, and what he’s learned about writing and writing in community since he accidentally founded NaNoWriMo in 1999.

Subscribe and download the episode, wherever you get your podcasts. 

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Chris Baty’s idea for National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) sprang into the world in 1999 with 21 friends writing novels together in the month of November. He watched the event grow to more than 300,000 writers in 90 countries. He’s currently working on a novel about an assistant librarian trying to return a DVD in post-apocalyptic Canada. He’s also the author of No Plot? No Problem! and the co-author of Ready, Set, Novel. In 2025, Chris launched NaNo2 with a group of other volunteers in the wake of NaNoWriMo closing its doors—and he’s happy to take the credit we’re giving him for being the father of it all.