Ashley Michelle Napier

Ashley is looking for provocateurs in fiction and non-fiction, working to identify and capture emerging trends, breaking events, and thought-provoking novels, reporting, and culture writing. Her background as a career journalist draws her to authors and journalists that define moments in the zeitgeist by way of compelling longform trade publishing projects.

Her fiction list includes projects with strong voice and big idea/high-concept storytellers and themes that asks the questions “what if” and “what happen when…” grounded in accessible, multi-dimensional characters. She also loves plot-driven un-putdownable suspenseful/psychological/domestic thrillers (horror-lite) with high stakes and big twists.

In non-fiction she represents narrative non-fiction based on investigative rigor and sparks off-page perspective. She loves a feminist history that expands our understanding of how yesterday’s sh*t-starters affected today’s world, cultural criticisms with a strong argument, voice-y and/or humorous memoirs that expand on little-known culture, or provide fresh perspectives on collective moments in history, personal stories imbued with cultural conversations. She also represents platform-driven authors with practical takeaways.

As the agency’s Foreign Rights Director, she also works to identify trend and market appetite on a global scale to advise the agencies talent to create internationally impactful media. In doing so, she has had a hands-on role in advancing the international careers of #1 New York Times bestseller, Imminent by Luis Elizondo, and Oprah Winfrey pick, All in Her Head by Dr. Elizabeth Comen, and #1 international bestselling author of Ready Player One, Ernest Cline.

Themes she’s currently loving:

• Female agency set against systems meant to keep them down
• People trying to understand themselves and assert control in systems that distort, constrain, or endanger them.
• Survival
• Relationships between humanity and tech
• Identity/adult coming of age
• Cultural explorations/examinations of systems and subcultures
• Finding meaning through trauma
• Obsession / High-control environments/cults
• West coast/California culture (extra points if it’s reflective of surfer/skater culture in the vein of The Barbarian Days)

What’s not for Ashley:

• Fantasy/ high fantasy
• Romantasy
• Strictly romance (books that include romance, but is not the central plot point or theme is okay)
• YA
• Middle-grade
• Children’s picture books

Submission Guidelines

Submissions should be emailed to anapier@yrgpartners.com

Please send a query letter and the first 10 pages of your manuscript pasted into the body of your email to: an*****@*********rs.com. Due to the volume of queries Ashley receives, she can only respond to those in which she’s interested. She very much looks forward to hearing from you!