Melissa Sarver White is an active literary agent at Folio Literary Management. She is currently closed to unsolicited submissions.
About Melissa Sarver White
Melissa Sarver White is a Vice President and literary agent at Folio Literary, where she also directs international rights. She worked in magazine editorial before building her career in New York book publishing. Her representation spans adult fiction and nonfiction, as well as children’s and young adult books.
Her current adult fiction interests include literary and upmarket fiction, commercial women’s fiction, romantic comedy, domestic suspense, and thrillers. She is particularly drawn to family relationships, outsider perspectives, vivid settings, and stories about people confronting injustice. In nonfiction, she seeks commercial projects in pop culture, science and psychology, self-help, parenting, memoir, business, lifestyle, and health and wellness. Her Folio Jr. profile currently marks her closed to children’s and YA submissions.
Melissa Sarver White — Literary Agent
Submitting Your Work to Melissa Sarver White
Before querying Melissa Sarver White
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From the Melissa Sarver White Submission Guidelines:
Submission guidelines: Email a query to melissa@foliolit.com with QUERY and the project title in the subject line. For fiction, paste the first 10 pages into the email body with the query letter.
Folio requires a complete, polished novel before querying; nonfiction writers need a complete proposal with a sample chapter. Send one project to one Folio agent at a time.
She responds only if interested; after 30 days without a reply, consider it a pass.
Current wishlist: In fiction, she seeks multigenerational stories, sibling relationships, outsider experiences, strong settings, and characters confronting injustice or difficult social circumstances. In nonfiction, she wants a strong voice, subject expertise, and an established platform.