Scott Andrew Mendel, Literary Agent Mendel Media Group, LLC, led by Scott Andrew Mendel, is an active literary agency based in New York City. The agency is open to queries and accepts submissions via postal mail, with specific guidelines for fiction and nonfiction works.
Scott Mendel has worked in publishing since the early 1990s, beginning as a magazine editor and freelance technical writer before joining Jane Jordan Browne’s literary agency in Chicago, where he eventually became Vice President and Director. In November 2002, he founded the Mendel Media Group in New York. He graduated summa cum laude from Bowdoin College and earned a master’s degree in English language and literature from the University of Chicago, where he also completed doctoral coursework.
Before and alongside his publishing career, Mendel taught at institutions including Choate-Rosemary Hall, Bowdoin College, the University of Chicago, and the University of Illinois at Chicago. He is the author of A Prosecutor’s Guide to Hate Crime, published through a U.S. Department of Justice grant, and has served as managing editor of Positively Aware and editor of the literary journal Quill. His writing also includes a produced play, fiction, book columns, news articles, and other works.
As a literary agent, Mendel has represented authors published by a broad range of major, independent, academic, and specialty presses. His clients’ publishers and imprints have included Random House, Simon & Schuster, HarperCollins, Penguin, Hachette, St. Martin’s Press, Little Brown, Tor/Forge, Kensington, Sourcebooks, Oxford University Press, Yale University Press, and many others. He has also been affiliated with numerous professional organizations in publishing, writing, and academia.
Hints
Most new clients of the agency are experienced, professional authors, including journalists and academics who have a history of publication, in book form or otherwise, or they are author-experts with serious credentials and established media access in their areas of expertise. In most cases, a new client will have a polished book proposal or manuscript already in hand.