Erin Murphy is an active agent with Aevitas Creative Management. She is currently closed to unsolicited submissions.
About Erin Murphy
Erin Murphy is a Partner at Aevitas Creative Management, where she specializes in children's literature. She founded Erin Murphy Literary Agency in 1999 and led the children's-focused agency for more than 25 years before EMLA joined Aevitas Creative Management in 2025.
Earlier in her career, Murphy served as editor-in-chief of an Arizona publishing house, acquiring children's books as well as adult nonfiction and lifestyle titles. Her clients' books have received major children's publishing honors including Newbery and Caldecott Honors, Sibert and Stonewall Medals, and numerous other national awards.
Murphy is particularly well known for representing picture-book writers but is currently looking to expand the middle-grade and young adult fiction side of her list.
Her interests include emotionally resonant middle-grade fantasy, multilayered mysteries, sweeping YA fantasy, strongly hooked thrillers, and narrative nonfiction for young readers.
She is especially drawn to distinctive voices, close friendships and found families, underdog relationships, culturally expansive fantasy settings, and stories portraying queer and BIPOC communities and joy. She also considers select author-illustrators with both a strong visual identity and accomplished writing.
Erin Murphy — Literary Agent
Submitting Your Work to Erin Murphy
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Submission Guidelines for Erin Murphy
Murphy wants to add more middle-grade and young adult fiction to a list historically known for picture books. She is particularly interested in stories involving unlikely underdog alliances, close sibling relationships, fierce friendships and found families, as well as stories depicting queer and BIPOC communities and joy.
For middle grade, she is seeking cozy, emotionally resonant fantasy and literary-leaning, multilayered mysteries. In YA, she wants sweeping fantasy with distinctive, fully developed worlds—particularly settings influenced by cultures outside the traditional European fantasy model—as well as thrillers with strong hooks. She is also interested in well-researched, propulsive narrative nonfiction for middle-grade and YA readers. Across categories, she particularly welcomes authors from marginalized communities
Submission Guidelines for Aevitas Creative Managment
Aevitas Creative Management accepts queries electronically through its online submission system. Writers should select an agent from the agency's current submissions page and follow that agent's Query Manager instructions. Agents who do not appear in the submission drop-down are currently closed to new submissions.
Submit to only one Aevitas agent at a time. Simultaneous submissions to multiple agents at the agency will be disregarded. The agency does not accept queries or manuscript submissions by mail or telephone, and mailed submission materials will not receive a response.
The submission form requests basic information about the author and project, including a one-sentence description, manuscript category, comparable titles, referral information, manuscript title, and the first 50 pages of the manuscript. Individual agents may have additional requirements or interests, so writers should review the selected agent's submission instructions before querying.
Aevitas represents fiction, nonfiction, memoir, history and narrative nonfiction, health and psychology, science and technology, religion and spirituality, food and cookbooks, fashion and design, children's, middle grade and young adult books, business and politics, humor, music and pop culture, arts and culture, and other selected categories. The agency does not represent original screenplays or screenwriters.
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