Larissa Melo Pienkowski

I’m incredibly lucky to work with a brilliant group of authors, representing both children’s and adult fiction and nonfiction. 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.

It might be hard to believe given the length, but the list below is not exhaustive! I’m always excited to fall in love with something new and unexpected, so if you have a project that falls outside of these parameters but you think we could be a good fit, please feel free to query me. 🙂

Adult Fiction

I love character-driven adult genre fiction, genre subversion, and what some editors have called “literary plus,” meaning fiction that pays particular attention to line-level writing but is driven by genre elements. I’m most compelled by an original, well-developed voice; nuanced characters whose propulsive, clearly defined desires and motivations bring them to life; and most importantly, books that make me feel.

Specific tastes:

• Friendship, chosen family, and unconventional love 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 high personal stakes and a unique premise
• Thrillers centered around underrepresented spies, assassins, and other clandestine characters, where the tone is wry and the plot is fun and fast-paced
• Whodunit murder mysteries, capers, and romps
• BIPOC and LGBTQIA+ protagonists reckoning with entry into primarily white, cis, heterosexual spaces, especially art spaces
• Non-Western, BIPOC-led grounded fantasy, which for me means fantasy primarily set in our world, perhaps with magical systems tied to non-Western cultures and folklore
• Feminist, anticolonial pursuits of revenge, justice, and power
• Original, 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 stories for people in their twenties and thirties
• Historical fiction with genre elements—think fantasy, Gothic, romance, mystery, etc.—and underexplored identities, experiences, and themes. I’d especially like to see more historical fiction set in recent decades that centers around underrepresented communities
• Books about books, no matter whether it’s literary, fantasy, contemporary, etc.

Adult Nonfiction

I gravitate to nonfiction with many of the same qualities as above, with a focus on voicey, engaging cultural commentary and reflections on justice, power, art, culture, beauty, the body politic, and society at large. I also love well-researched microhistories—the more niche the better!

Specific tastes:

• Narrative nonfiction that blends memoir with beautifully crafted investigative journalism
• Microhistories that make poignant, meaningful connections between niche subjects and humanity. If it can be described as “a love letter to __” 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, murder, 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 pop culture, justice, decolonization, and liberation
• Multicultural cookbooks written by authors with a platform 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 fuse together. A comprehensive Brazilian cookbook that explores recipes by region is high on my list, in the spirit of Mexico: The Beautiful Cookbook by Susanna Palazuelos

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.

I’m open to 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, I’m interested in similar elements, characters, and themes as above, but my tastes can also 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; LGBTQIA+ protagonists in historical YA; and non-Western folklore with texture and depth. 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.

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Across the board, I am NOT a good fit for:

• stories centered around a specific identity written by authors who don’t share that identity
• apocalyptic, post-apocalyptic, technological sci-fi, or dystopian novels (unless it embraces hope in the vein of A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers)
• true crime, short stories/novellas, comedy/humor, chapter books, Christian or “clean” romance, steampunk, Tolkien-esque high fantasy, or novels-in-verse
• extraterrestrials, elves, robots, fae, dragons, werewolves, zombies, or unicorns (though I do love ghosts, mermaids, bruxas, non-Western mythological creatures, and feminist interpretations of monsters)
• books with a 110K+ word count
• 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
• WWII or Civil War historical fiction (unless written from a marginalized perspective we haven’t heard from before)
• straight memoirs (narrative nonfiction is okay, per above), COVID-centered books, or diet and wellness nonfiction that is inherently fatphobic
• 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