Larissa Melo Pienkowski

As a queer, mixed-race, neurodivergent Latina who grew up hungry for stories that mirrored my own and those around me, I’m focused on championing BIPOC, LGBTQIA+, disabled, neurodivergent, international, and other historically excluded authors across genre. I believe books are a critical tool in the fight for justice and liberation, and I’m passionate about bringing books into the world that challenge the status quo and make people feel seen.

Adult Fiction

In adult fiction, I’m looking for what some editors have called “literary plus,” meaning literary fiction driven by storytelling elements and propulsion most often found in genre fiction. Beautiful writing and an original, confident voice are a must, as are complex characters whose clearly defined desires and motivations bring them to life and drive the emotional stakes up. I’m especially interested in BIPOC and LGBTQ+ characters with a hidden agenda and dark wit, plots that situate characters in circumstances we rarely, if ever, expect to see them in, and novels that critique capitalism, colonialism, institutions, cultural trends, obsessions, and other elements of the society we live in, whether done contemplatively or with humor.

Some specific wants:

• Sprawling friendship and chosen family stories that trace the evolution of relationship dynamics over the course of decades. I’d love to see a book like this set in South or Central America—Brazil in particular.
• Heists, cons, and scams with a unique premise and high personal stakes that intertwine with a desire to take down an aspect of capitalism and/or colonialism, much like Portrait of a Thief by Grace D. Li
• Literary thrillers featuring women who become spies or assassins under unexpected circumstances, where the tone is wry and the plot is fun and fast-paced
• BIPOC and LGBTQIA+ protagonists reckoning with entry into primarily white, cis, heterosexual spaces, especially academia and art
• Non-Western, BIPOC-led grounded fantasy (which for me means fantasy primarily set in our world) that casts searing social commentary through a fantastical and/or magical lens
• Feminist, anticolonial pursuits of revenge, justice, and power, especially in the aftermath of trauma
• Original, laugh-out-loud funny, high-heat contemporary and historical romance and rom-coms where the chemistry is undeniable, the overarching plot is as important as the romance, and you could cut the tension with a knife
• Coming-of-age/coming-of-rage stories for people in their twenties and thirties, ideally with a strong dose of snark and social commentary
• Historical fiction with genre elements—think fantasy, Gothic, romance, mystery, etc.—featuring BIPOC and LGBTQ+ characters. I’m especially interested in historical fiction set in not-often-seen cultures and snapshots of time.
• Books about books, the evolution of language, translation, poets and poetry, and the written word in general.

Adult Nonfiction

In nonfiction, I’m looking for authors with a strong platform who are writing voicey, engaging, on-the-pulse cultural commentary and reflections on capitalism and colonization, power and privilege, race and identity, gender and sexuality, art and culture, beauty and the body politic, and academia and intellectualism. I’m a sucker for narrative nonfiction that reads like a novel while still being meditative, and I have a deep and abiding love for well-researched microhistories—the more niche the better.

Some specific wants:

• Microhistories that make poignant, meaningful connections between niche subjects and humanity. If it can be described as “a love letter to X” or be comped to an Ologies podcast episode, I want to read it. I’m especially on the lookout for microhistories having to do with beauty, fragrance, poison, psychedelics/plant medicine, sex and the erotic, heists/cons/scams/thefts, and topics that might be seen as taboo but have broader connections to humanity at large.
• Essay collections that chronicle contemporary life through the lens of cultural critique, pop culture, justice, decolonization, and liberation
• Multicultural cookbooks that center authentic recipes from underrepresented cuisines and/or fusions between cultures, as long as the author can speak intimately to the ways these cultures meld together. A comprehensive Brazilian cookbook that explores recipes by region is high on my list.

Middle-Grade and YA Fiction

While I’m taking on middle-grade and YA fiction extra selectively at the moment, I will absolutely keep reading if the characters’ voices jump off the page so vividly that I forget an adult wrote the book. Picture books are almost always a hard sell for me, but I’m open to being surprised.

I love middle-grade fiction across genre, especially if there’s a ragtag group of friends at its core, or if it handles heavier topics in a moving way. I want to see more marginalized kids experiencing joy, though I won’t shy away from original storylines centered around identity. I laugh and cry very easily, and my favorite middle-grade books make me do both.

In YA, my tastes can skew a little darker. I’m always on the lookout for queer, feminist, and anticolonial revenge, coming of rage, and “good for her/them” books; original twists on dark academia; “unlikeable” protagonists; high-stakes heists, cons, and scams; and LGBTQIA+ protagonists in historical YA. I usually prefer the stakes to be high, but if the voice, characters, plot, and emotional depth are immersive enough, I’m open to “quieter” stories as well.

____________________________________________________

I am NOT a good fit for:

• stories about a specific marginalized identity or experience written by authors who don’t share that identity
• books with a 100K+ word count
• apocalyptic, post-apocalyptic, or dystopian novels (unless it embraces hope in the vein of A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers)
• true crime
• Christian or “clean” romance
• Tolkien-esque high fantasy, or books that feature elves, fae, dragons, werewolves, zombies, or unicorns (though I do love ghosts, mermaids, bruxas, non-Western mythological creatures, and feminist interpretations of monsters)
• novels-in-verse
• stories that include animal cruelty or gratuitous, visceral descriptions of hate crimes, sexual assault, or domestic violence
• pro-military, pro-police, or pro-genocide books
• anything having to do with Nazis, Zionists, or terrorists
• historical war fiction
• diet and wellness nonfiction unless written from a fat liberationist framework
• nonfiction centered on business, economics, or capital-P politics

Submission Guidelines

Please query me via my Query Manager link: https://QueryTracker.net/query/lmpnk

Consultations