Submissions

Thank you for your interest in submitting your novel or nonfiction book proposal to Folio Literary Management, LLC.

Please do not submit simultaneously to more than one agent at Folio. If you're not sure which of us is exactly right for your book, don't worry. We work closely as a team, and if one of our agents gets a query that might be more appropriate for someone else, we'll always pass it along.

Please note: Folio Literary Management does not represent poetry, stage plays, or screenplays.

Step #1: Please visit the Personnel section of our website and read the bios of each of our individual agents to figure out which of us might be right for your project, and our individual submission preferences.

• Please wait until you've got a completed, polished novel or a complete nonfiction proposal with a sample chapter to query any of us. Our nonfiction proposal guidelines can be found here.
• Be sure that your cover letter, manuscript, and supplemental materials are properly formatted, and the best you think they can be: that means well-proofed, well-written, and well-presented.
• Please contact us about one project at a time. You may have a drawer full of fabulous yet-to-be-published manuscripts, but only tell us about the one you feel is the most polished, the most ready to go.

Step #2: Contact us.

In your cover letter, tell us briefly what the book is about, and a little about yourself. If you've never approached us before, the best thing to do is to send a one-page query letter about your project. Guidelines on writing an effective query letter can be found here.

• A well-written query letter.
• Additional materials as per individual agent's preferences (listed in their bio), but in no case should you send more than 50 pages, or the first three consecutive chapters (for fiction), or a proposal (nonfiction) to give us an idea of your writing style and competence. DON'T send an entire manuscript without our asking for it - why waste the postage or the trees?
• Your professional background as a writer, or whatever pertinent facts about yourself which you feel are important for us to know.
• Self-Addressed Stamped Envelope (SASE) with sufficient postage (not checks or money orders) to return your material, if you want your material returned. Materials sent without a SASE will be recycled.

• Paste the text of your query into the email as plain text, since we do not open unsolicited email attachments.

Step #3: Now What?

If we do ask to see further materials, here are some basic guidelines for submitting soliciting fiction and nonfiction.

We do our best to respond to all queries as soon as possible, whether we're interested or not. If you haven't heard back from us in a month, however, it's possible that something has gone wrong, and your query has been lost - in that case, please send a follow-up the same way you sent the initial query, and include the text of your original.

We look forward to hearing from you! It's as important for us to find good literary talent as it is for you to find good representation. We take all of the queries submitted to us very seriously, and are always on the lookout for new literary talent.