Meet literary agent Alia Hanna Habib

By Kathryn Craft

About McCormick & Williams
McCormick & Williams is an independent literary agency specializing in literary and commercial fiction and quality non-fiction, including memoir, history, narrative, biography, lifestyle, sports, self-help, and pop culture. Devoted to representing authors at every aspect of successful publishing, their agents are closely involved in each stage of a project, working in tandem with authors to develop ideas, craft proposals, and edit manuscripts to achieve the best marketplace results. Looking beyond the immediate deal, they make certain that their authors are well-served throughout the publication process, with a hands-on approach to editing, design, publicity, marketing, and sales. And as an agency built on the talents and promise of their authors, they take an active role in career management, helping their authors reach their widest possible audience through all available avenues, including magazine writing, lecturing, and the sale of foreign, film/tv, and subsidiary rights throughout the world. Check out some of the recent titles they represented.

About Alia Hanna Habib
After graduating from Barnard College, Alia Hanna Habib began her publishing career at Houghton Mifflin as a publicity assistant to the Director of Cookbook Publicity. There, she says, she "discovered two unexpected loves: cookbooks and breaking out new talent." From reading cookbooks, she learned to cook, and after reading the manuscript of Everything Is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer, she volunteered to work extra hours to help with the publicity campaign. In 2002, she left Houghton to pursue a graduate degree in nineteenth-century British literature. After graduate school, she lived in Italy, where she volunteered on organic farms throughout the Italian peninsula. On returning to New York, Habib was re-hired by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt as a publicity manager. Some of her most notable campaigns include How We Decide by Jonah Lehrer, Whatever It Takes by Paul Tough, Mrs. Astor Regrets by Meryl Gordon, Finding Nouf by Zoë Ferraris, and Hello, Cupcake! by Karen Tack and Alan Richardson. Habib is now a literary agent at McCormick & Williams in New York City. She lives in Brooklyn and says she still loves to cook.

What she represents: Narrative non-fiction, memoir, and cookbooks, as well as the occasional novel that strikes her fancy (among them, literary fiction and mysteries).


For more about Alia:
Interview in ASJA Monthly [expanded bio information above is excerpted from this interview by Barbara DeMarco-Barrett] that includes how Alia uses her publicity background as an agent.


Have a subscription to Publisher's Marketplace? You can see Alia's most recent deals here.

Meet literary agent Katie Grimm

By Kathryn Craft

About Don Congdon Associates
Early in his career as a literary agent, Don Congdon developed an enviable reputation as a skilled editor, tough negotiator and shrewd judge of talent. While still a young editor at Simon & Schuster, he championed the early stories of Ray Bradbury (you may have heard of him!), who became one of his first clients after he became a full-time literary agent in 1947. “I married Don Congdon the same month I married my wife,” Bradbury said in a speech to the National Book Foundation in 2000. “So I had 53 years of being spoiled by my wife and by Don Congdon. We’ve never had a fight or an argument during that time because he’s always been out on the road ahead of me clearing away the dragons and the monsters and the fakes.” Bradbury dedicated his novel Fahrenheit 451 to Congdon. In 1983 Congdon started his own agency, Don Congdon Associates. He died in 2009 at the age of 91, and since then the agency has been run by his son, Michael. The agency represents over one hundred authors, many of whom have appeared on best-seller lists and have won numerous awards, including: Pulitzer Prize and George Polk Award for Journalism winners Russell Baker and Edna Buchanan; National Book Award recipient Ellen Gilchrist; New York Times Best Seller Kathryn Stockett (The Help); James Thurber Prize winner David Sedaris; and Edgar and Grand Master of Horror award winner Richard Matheson.

About Katie Grimm
Katie Grimm joined Don Congdon Associates in 2007 and is a member of the AAR and SCBWI. A self-described "insatiable reader," she worked in a library before starting as the agency's literary assistant/office manager. She is now building her own list.

What she is looking for: Vivid literary fiction, transportive historical fiction, up-market women’s fiction, cohesive short story collections, lurid mysteries and thrillers with exotic or historical settings, high-concept young adult, and middle grade with heart and humor. Most importantly, she hooked by fiction with emotional resonance and longevity, and in her opinion, this requires an authentic voice, relatable characters, and a twisting plot that keeps her intrigued. For non-fiction, she is looking for offbeat narrative non-fiction, history, memoir with distinct voice, multi-cultural, and counter-culture.

What she is not looking for: Romance, high fantasy, adult speculative fiction, hard sci-fi, thrillers with terrorist plots, how-to, or inspirational.

For more about Katie:
Interview at Chuck Sambuchino's Guide to Literary Agents blog that includes why she loves "surprising protagonists."

Interview at WordHustler including what she likes in a query and why she loves YA/MG.

Interview at Middle Grade Ninja that includes her favorite books, movies, and shows and a description of her ideal client.

Meet Literary Agent Blair Hewes

By Kathryn Craft

In addition to listening to pitches and participating on our agent panel, Blair Hewes of Dunham Literary, Inc. and her good friend, literary agent Katie Grimm of Don Congdon Associates, will co-lead our Friday night session on how to pitch to agents and editors, which they've titled "Tuning Your Pitch: The Essential Notes."

There's business to their relationship as well: Dunham Literary, Don Congdon Associates, and the Denise Marcil Literary Agency have formed an alliance so they can share office space and combine back office activities. Their companies and their decisions about representation, however, remain separate. What you need to know: it's fine to submit query letters to all three agencies.

Here's some more about Blair and her agency.

About Dunham Literary
Jennie Dunham has been a literary agent in New York City since May 1992. She started her career at John Brockman Associates and then Mildred Marmur Associates. She was employed by Russell & Volkening for 6 years before she left to found Dunham Literary, Inc. in August 2000. She has been a member of AAR (Association of Authors Representatives) since 1993. She served on the Program Committee and was Program Committee Director for several years. She attended international meetings as the AAR representative to create the ISTC (International Standard Text Code) which is being created to ISO (International Standardization Organization) specifications. This business and tracking system will be based on titles not book formats (as is the case with ISBN) and will work in tandem with ISBN.

About Blair Hewes
Blair Hewes is a member of the Association of Authors’ Representatives and serves on their Program Committee. She is also a member of the Society of Children’s Book Writers & Illustrators.

What she's looking for: Literary and commercial fiction, narrative non-fiction, and books for children of all ages. Whether for children or adults, she believes it is important to provide books for both the reader actively looking to expand his or her mind and the one who simply wants to be swept up in a good story, but a truly exceptional book accomplishes both aims together. She is also interested in representing authors of non-fiction books in the categories of pop-culture, historical biography, lifestyle, and women’s issues.

What she's not looking for: Westerns, hard boiled crime fiction, horror, or political or medical thrillers. Says Blair, "While I love a book with a romantic element, I don’t do genre romance."

Read a blog post by Blair's satisfied author Bettina Restrepo, who calls Blair "the person she didn't even know she was hoping for."

Meet literary agent Molly Jaffa

by Kathryn Craft

Young adult (YA) and middle grade (MG) continue to be hot, and Folio Literary Management knows it. That's why they've created a new division, Folio Jr., to target this important market. One of Folio Jr.'s four agents, Molly Jaffa, will be at our conference to hear pitches and to give a session specific to YA/MG authors, Getting a “YES!”: From Query to Representation in Ten Steps. 

About Folio Literary Management
A full-service literary management company in New York City since 2006, Folio Literary Management places both fiction and non-fiction with major publishers throughout the U.S. and around the world. They represent many first-time authors, some of whom have gone on to become bestsellers and major award-winners. Folio also represents many well-established authors, and works closely with them to take their careers to new heights. Client Garth Stein's novel told through a dog's point of view, The Art of Racing in the Rain, has been on the bestseller lists for 73 weeks and counting. Folio is proud to offer a full complement of literary services in a changing publishing landscape, and provide their clients with access to marketing services, website development, and the media training it takes to make each book a success. They are dedicated to supporting authors across all platforms, from film adaptation to enhanced e-books and apps.

About Folio Jr.
Folio Jr. is the division of Folio Literary Management devoted exclusively to the representation of today’s most stellar children’s book authors and artists. Folio Jr. agents are wholly committed to offering their clients 360º of impeccable, hands-on care. They strive not only to find the most un-put-down-able new voices as well as to find the most can’t-take-your-eyes-off-it new styles of illustration, but also to guide their established writers and illustrators to new heights in their publishing careers. For a list of Folio Jr. Clients, click here.

About Molly Jaffa
Molly has been with Folio Literary Management since 2008. As the agency's Subsidiary Rights Associate, she aggressively pursues the sale of Folio clients' audio and foreign rights, helping to grow their careers in as many formats as possible. Molly is actively building her own client list as part of the launch of Folio Jr., an initiative within the agency devoted to children's and YA titles. An “editorial agent,” Molly works closely with clients to make their manuscripts as strong as possible.

What she is looking for: Molly is particularly interested in voice-driven, high concept MG and YA fiction; projects with elements of magical realism or historical fantasy; characters who have strong passions, smarts, or skills; and books that open up a rich new world (real or imagined!) for the reader to discover.

What she is not looking for: Picture books, boy books (no gross-out humor, aliens, gore, etc.), and paranormal fantasy.

To read more about Molly:

Interview at E.I. Johnson's blog "A View from the Top," where Molly says "it's all about the voice."

Interview at "Mother. Write. (Repeat)." blog, in which Molly shares her agenting philosophy, and the difference between magical realism (which she likes) and paranormal romance (which she doesn't).

Another take on what Molly represents.

Introducing Lisa Rector-Maass!

By Tammy Burke

It is with great delight to announce that independent editor and owner, Lisa Rector-Maass, of Third Draft New York City http://www.thirddraftnyc.com/ will be one of our conference presenters and one of our pre-conference workshop leaders.

Lisa brings a wide range of experiences with her, starting her writing career at 17 as the youngest writer at BC Woman magazine in Vancouver, Canada. She has been a journalist, publicist, bookseller, agent and editor. She has served on the Surrey International’s Writers’ Conference Board and is the staff editor at Donald Maass’ Breakout Novel Workshops. Plus, she teaches at conferences worldwide often times with her husband, Donald Maass. She is an award winning writer, founder of the Lisa Rector Young Writer’s Scholarship and author of her upcoming book The Third Draft.


Her specialty is late story issues, sagging middles and third draft woes and she has helped authors achieve book deals with Tor/MacMillan, Berkley Prime Crime and others. Questions she focuses on in her 11th hour checklist include “How much of each page centers on sequential action?” “What emotional triggers are in place and how have they been used to incite conflict?” and “Do characters inhabit the world of the story or simply pass through it?” These are the issues that create a sympathetic reader, one who will cheerfully forgo sleep in order to read your book, that crowning achievement that every writer wants.

Lisa works with thrillers, suspense, mystery, historical, fantasy, mainstream and literary fiction. She does not take poetry, non-fiction, picture books, science fiction or horror.

The four hour workshop she is teaching on Friday, March 25, 2011, Sagging Middle will provide you the expertise in enlivening voice, renewing conflict, and heightening subtext and tension. You should bring a WIP and writing materials.

In addition to teaching her workshop, she is also giving two sessions during the conference. The first one is on Third Draft Issues for story diagnosis and repair for when that last elusive 10 percent isn’t working in your manuscript and The First 50 Pages which helps you to discover what is working and what isn’t.

To find out more about Lisa, please click on the interview links below:

http://writerunboxed.com/2008/08/22/interview-with-an-editor-lisa-rector-part-1/


http://writerunboxed.com/2008/08/29/interview-with-an-editor-lisa-rector-part-2/


http://victoriamixon.com/category/interviews/maass-rector-interviews/

Meet literary agent Adam Friedstein

by Kathryn Craft


A great way for a rookie author to gain literary representation—beyond having a top-notch novel or nonfiction proposal—is to query a newer agent at an established literary agency. It's a "best of both worlds" scenario: you get in on the ground floor with an agent who is working hard to build his list and establish himself in the industry, while benefiting from the agency's reputation and combined experience.


The agents coming to the 2011 Write Stuff conference fit this description perfectly. One of them is Adam Friedstein of Anderson Literary Management.

About Anderson Literary Management
Anderson Literary Management is the culmination of Kathleen Anderson’s three decades of publishing experience, thirteen of those years as an agent, seventeen as an editor. In 1995, she made the unorthodox decision (at the time, which is commonplace now) to “jump the fence” and leave institutional publishing for the entrepreneurial world of agenting. The decision was prescient because, in fairly short order, her authors gained international reputations on the back of her established tenure as an editor. It was a liberating move, allowing her to become more closely aligned with the discovery of authors and manage their artistic development. Her literary acumen attracted writers of all stripes without the restrictions of working for a single imprint of a publishing house. Now ALM represents authors to the industry as a whole. Their projects are roughly 50% fiction, 50% nonfiction.


The agency's philosophy: "We are committed, spunky, empathetic communicators, representing authors who are truth-tellers as well as story-tellers. We foster long-term relationships based on integrity, sound business practices, mutual respect, and companionship. We represent authors, not books – meaning, we manage and nurture the careers and ideas of writers over many books, not just on a book-by-book basis – and we remain active as partners throughout the publishing process. We orchestrate publishing and media deals worldwide involving factors both personal and professional, because matching writers with the right people to publish, film, and stage their work is our key to their success."


About Adam Friedstein
Adam Friedstein of Anderson Literary Management grew up on the North Shore of Massachusetts and holds a B.A. in Comparative Literature from Bard College. He began his publishing career in 2005 at Writers House, later going on to the foreign rights department at Harold Ober Associates, and most recently Trident Media Group where he worked with agents Ellen Levine, Alex Glass, and Melissa Flashman and authors such as Christopher Andersen, Russell Banks, Stanley Fish, and Matt Bondurant. 


What Adam is looking for: Books that make statements, books with captivating characters and loud voices, books with unique perspectives on the familiarity of adolescence and adulthood, specifically debut literary fiction, literary thrillers, young adult fiction and narrative and serious nonfiction, including memoir, popular science, and pop-culture books.


More about his interests in "serious nonfiction": In addition to other categories mentioned above, this includes biographies, histories, extrapolated critical essays, travel books, idea books in technology, politics, education. Books researched and written by authors with appropriate qualifications. 


More about his interests in YA: Historicals; "I like YA on the darker, older side as well—quirky stories that remind me of the pathos of adolescence in a creative way."


What he's not interested in: Celebrity memoirs, or prescriptive dating and weight loss books. He also admits to never having been a big sci-fi or fantasy guy.


Read an interview with Adam at Chuck Sambuchino's Guide to Literary Agents blog.

2011 Write Stuff Conference

First, welcome to the 2011 Write Stuff Conference Blog! 

In the upcoming weeks, you will find all sorts of information, interviews and tips about our upcoming conference on March 25 – 26, 2011, plus our two days of pre-conference workshops on March 24 – 25, 2011.


The first announcement I’d like to make is regarding our keynote speaker.

Donald Maass almost doesn’t need an introduction. Besides being the CEO of the Donald Maass Literary Agency in New York, a leading agency for fiction writers, a past president of the Association of Authors’ Representatives, Inc. (AAR), and on the board of advisors for Writers’ Digest, he is widely recognized for the workshops he teaches across the country based on his widely acclaimed Writer’s Digest’s books on the craft of writing, Writing the Breakout Novel, Writing the Breakout Novel Workbook and Fire in Fiction.

Maass defines the most crucial elements in writing THE book which your readers won’t set down.  I've heard it said many, many times:  If you want to take your writing to the next level, his patented techniques and workshops will give you the tools necessary to possess that potential for hitting that best sellers’ list.

It gives me distinct pleasure to announce that not only will Maass be this year's keynote speaker but GLVWG is offering a special two days of pre-conference workshops.  Maass will be teaching an 8 hour workshop “Writing the Breakout Novel” Thursday, March 24, 2011 and 4 hour  “Fire in Fiction” Friday, March 25, 2011.

Registration will open mid-January. The date is forthcoming very shortly along with other very important details.   Please stay tuned.

Also, please visit our blog often for exciting information as we announce our agents, editors, and presenters along with interviews, information and conference tips.

Questions, please contact me, Tammy Burke, conference chair, at writestuffchair@glvwg.org

Hope to see you at the conference March 24 – 26, 2011!