Our Board

Have you ever wondered who is behind LetterMo? We have a dedicated team of volunteers who have taken over responsibility for the community from our founder, Mary Robinette Kowal. The board meets monthly throughout the year and weekly in January and February to keep everything running smoothly. we wanted to take a moment to introduce ourselves! You’ll find us writing blog posts, interacting on the forums and social media accounts, and writing letters to our pen pals (maybe even you).

Where do you live? 

I live in the beautiful city of Vancouver, on the west coast of Canada, surrounded by towering mountains and the sea.

What year did you first participate in the Month of Letters challenge?

I signed up for LetterMo and participated for the first time in 2018. Other than one year due to a big move, I have participated every year, though I have not always succeeded in the challenge. Nonetheless, I have enjoyed writing letters to friends and receiving mail from friends around the world.

Why do you write letters?

There is something wonderful about the realness of sending mail. So much of our world today is ephemeral and instantaneous, but when I write a letter, I put actual ink to paper, and it takes time to be received because it is physically traveling on a journey around the world. It is a wonderful counter to so much else in our world that demands our attention now and is then gone just as quickly as it came. But a letter from a friend and I can sit down and enjoy and pick up again to reread. I can take my time composing it, whether in the early morning when my husband is still asleep and my dog has not yet risen (he is not a morning dog). When it is done and I walk it to the post box on the corner, I send it on its way, knowing that it will get there when it gets there (#CanadaPost).

What tips or tricks would you offer to first time participants?

First, don’t be afraid of sending postcards! My first year I didn’t have any pen pals, and so I couldn’t write to one every day of the month. Instead, I wrote to a couple of pen pals I found on LetterMo, I sent cards to family and friends, and I filled in the rest with PostCrossing. Second, find a good system for keeping track of your correspondence. If you have only one or two pen pals, it isn’t hard. But once you have more than that, it gets hard to remember where I am in a conversation or what I’ve shared previously. I began experimenting last year with a letter journal, which helped a lot during February and beyond.

Where do you live?

I live in the DMV–the (Washington) D.C., Maryland, and Virginia area.

What year did you first participate in the Month of Letters challenge?

2022

Why do you write letters?

I write letters to meet and learn about people who live and experience the world differently than I do. Having an ongoing conversation via snail mail is so unlike the instant reply of a text message; sending a letter is like sending a little piece of ourselves out into the world, hoping to bring a little joy to its recipient.

What tips or tricks would you offer to first time participants?

Write about what makes you happy. Is there something on a friend’s profile that inspired you to connect with them? Ask them about that, or share about your own interests and life.

Request and accept friends to whom you can commit to write or reply at least once. It’s OK to not accept a request if you do not have the bandwidth to reply.

Set a timer or a page limit to dedicate space in your day. 

If you like writing to a friend, tell them you want to keep the exchange going throughout the year.

Where do you live?

Gainesville, Florida, USA, Native (but not Indigenous) Floridian. My hubby and I made our final mortgage payment during the pandemic, and plan to stay as long as we’re both employed by the local university.

What year did you first participate in the Month of Letters challenge?

I started LetterMo in 2014, so I guess this makes it ten years of falling behind on responses. I appreciate my very patient pen pals!

Tell us about a letter you sent or received that holds special meaning for you

So my first real experiences writing postcards and letters with regularity were for two separate writing projects. The first I asked my friends for volunteers to receive postcards from characters I’d create for them. I had a bunch of postcards I’d bought on my travels, and this seemed like an interesting way to use them. I lasted about 5 or 6 outgoing postcards to each person, developing a story via the snippets that fit on the cards. My second was a story I co-wrote with a friend, with me writing as one character, and she writing as the other.It was only later that I began sending my correspondence to (and from) real people.

What tips or tricks would you offer to first time participants?

One of the great things I’ve found about writing to penpals that I meet through the site is that you can looking over profiles and find something you have in common with them to start off the conversation. Don’t worry about your first letter being the next installment of a great epistolary saga, just seed the letter with a bit of yourself, and ask the other person about themselves, and you’ll have something to grow the conversation over more letters.

Where do you live? 

My husband and I bought our first home at the end of 2020, in the Pacific Northwest. We live on a four and a half acre homestead out in a rural part of King County, about an hour’s drive from the city of Seattle.

What year did you first participate in the Month of Letters challenge?

Gosh, that’s a good question. I know it was before the pandemic, but I don’t recall the first year I joined. At least five years ago.

Tell us about a letter you sent or received that holds special meaning for you

I wrote a letter to the author, Leon Uris, and he wrote me back. It was a typewritten letter with an actual, real signature in what was probably a ballpoint pen. I cherished it for a long time. I also received a cloth postcard, where the sender literally sewed some cloth to the back of the card and sent it to me.

I love to write letters because it allows me to slow down and really think – about the person I’m writing, about what’s going on in my daily round, and what I want to talk about. It’s an opportunity for connection and reflection.

What tips or tricks would you offer to first time participants?

Don’t panic, just write. Set a timer for 30 minutes and write a letter. You only have to do one letter a day. Don’t let the best be the enemy of the good – if you need to start with small cards, then do that. You can always add more narrative on a free sheet of paper and fold it inside the card. Just do it. 🙂