Kate McKean
@kate_mckean
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Queries via Query Manager only . Literary Agent & VP at Morhaim Literary. Heir to the Holy Rings of Betazed. Rep’d by @Michaelbourret
Brooklyn, NY
Joined September 2008
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Pinned Tweet
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When I sign an email “Yours” it’s not a term of endearment— it means this email is now yours I’m done with it get it away from me.
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@amandamull
I once passed a mom pushing a stroller and holding a bunch of balloons and they slipped from her grasp but I was able to grab them before flew away and even on my worst days I think at least I was able to do that
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Illustrators and artists: TAKE CARE OF YOUR HANDS AND WRISTS. They are your livelihood!
1. Take breaks
2. Consider rest & breaks as part of your workload and factor that in
3. Learn stretches that help you
4. Pay attention to your posture and positioing
5. Don't grip too tight!
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@AlixEHarrow
Quinn has asked us, repeatedly, for months: “What time are you going to die?”
We live near a very large cemetery.
💀💀💀💀💀💀💀💀
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@TheEllenShow
You should have
@dog_rates
on your show to talk about how he developed this idea In Nov 2015 and give away a copy of his book to everyone in the audience.
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@clhubes
Mine (5yo) says: "I tried that before in Mexico and didn't like it." They have never been to Mexico. They saw one Sesame Street about Mexico when they were 3 and now everything happened when they were in Mexico.
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My two miscarriages were detected at 7 and 9 weeks respectively, so just make sure that doesn't happen to you in Texas. (You cannot make sure that doesn't happen to you.)
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Saw a girl's phone alarm on the train and it said "fuck it, just go back to sleep."
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Do you ever get nervous before starting a big book you know you’re going to love? Like you know it’s going to take over your life and you’ll be so sad when it ends.
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I sent myself a Harry & David basket b/c yeah I did have a pretty great year work-wise.
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"Listen to me when I am talking to you. I am a human being, and I am more than a vessel and I speak for my daughter whom I never heard cry. I speak for that 17-year-old girl bent across a kitchen counter. I speak for the strange woman I have become."
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I am reading a document on paper and I just looked at the top of the page to see what time it was.
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“What do you do?”
“I’m a literary agent.”
“Oh. So you...books?”
“It’s like an actor’s agent, but with books.”
“Did you do Harry Potter?”
“No.”
“Everyone always says I should write a book. It’d be about—“
<runs away screaming>
"What do you do?"
"I'm a freelance journalist."
"Oh I'm jealous, funemployment is the best."
"I am constantly working."
"I'm sure you'll find a job some day. Maybe try starting with an internship!"
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THE CAT IN THE HAT is epitome of all my anxieties: rule breaking, getting in trouble, making a mess, protests going unheeded. I can't even read it to my kid without my heart racing.
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I just sent a signed contract back to a publisher that took 14 months and over 50 emails (plus phone conversations) to iron out. I feel victorious. This is why you have an agent.
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Authors, you know why you should retweet your praise? Because half the time your followers don't realize it's a retweet and they just see "everyone" talking about how great your book is. Which is the MOST POWERFUL kind of marketing!! Let's readers' inattention work FOR you!
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What are your favorite books about writing craft and/or book publishing BESIDES:
Bird by Bird
On Writing
Before & After the Book Deal
Craft in the Real World
How to Write/Autobio Novel
What Editors Do
The Writing Life
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I just wrote 1500 words in an hour and didn’t look at my phone, email, or Twitter once. Please clap.
#1000wordsofsummer
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If someone doesn’t make this the cover of a YA fantasy novel then publishing has failed.
GHOST APPLES 👻🍎
After freezing rain in Michigan, apples that hadn’t been picked got coated in ice. Many fell off the tree. Some had their insides turn to mush as apples have lower freezing points. The mush and skin fell, leaving these “ghost apples.”
📷: Andrew Sietsema
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Men will literally change the whole name of a global social media company instead of going to therapy
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12 years ago, I joined the Howard Morhaim Literary Agency.
In that time I've had:
4 million lunches
182 reported deals
6 New York Times best sellers
4 books about cats with bad grammar
1 officially licensed Star Trek book
The very best job in the world
#teammckean
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When someone says "You should write a book!!!!!!" they probably don't know what they are talking about.
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@Nicole_Cliffe
We only got “sugar cereal” on our birthdays and the birthday kid got to pick what kind and didn’t have to share if they didn’t want to. I thought kids who had Froot Loops on the reg were cheating or breaking some kind of rule.
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One of the greatest gifts you can give to yourself as a writer is to learn how to insert a page break in your document, instead of just mashing return.
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Corporations: look how much money we made! We’re doing so well now.
Employees: Great! You can pay us more!
Corporations: Oh we were talking to the shareholders.
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$1500 IS NOT THAT MUCH TO CONTRIBUTE TO MY DREAM WEDDING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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I don’t need a recap of the early days of the pandemic!!! I remember!!!!
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Publishing editorial departments: I'm begging you to put out rosters of your staff! Email them to me and I will share as far and wide as I can! I know it takes time! But it is the LEAST you can do to help your up and coming staff!
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I just misspelled spaceship as spacesheep and thus have dibs on writing that picture book.
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@celebrityhottub
Talked with my landlord about how the guys who remolded this kitchen didn’t use quarter round to finish the kickboards.
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Now, more than ever, publishers need to send agents rosters of their editors. We can't go to lunch! Tell us who we can send new projects to!
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WE RIDE AT DAWN TO AVENGE THE WOMAN IN THIS FIRST QUESTION
#DearPrudie
: She could have been home an hour earlier every night for our baby if she hadn’t done this project. Help!
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Did your event or book tour get cancelled? I took a look at the numbers from a real, live event to show just how few books a tour usually sells and why it's not the end of the world if you don't go on tour.
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NO ONE TALK TO ME AND MY LARGE ADULT OWL
Ventura county firefighters saved a ‘Great Horned’ owl.
The photos are exactly what you’d hope for.
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Professional emails you would not send under any other context (but people think it's appropriate to send them to agents).
A Thread:
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Today marks 13 years as an agent with the Howard Morhaim Literary Agency. 🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆
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Instead of pregnant I'm going to call myself a freelance genetic engineer.
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Will the assistant editor who said “You can’t be Twitter woke and Walmart ambitious” in this article please email me? I would like to go to lunch with you.
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If I ever finish and actually sell this novel I’m effing writing then I’m going to need y’all to
at least like pat me on the head this shit is hard.
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Me: drags my feet on vital tasks like taxes, cooking healthy food, exercising, etc
Also Me: will immediately cut up the plastic rings around a six pack into confetti lest it possibly hurt a sea turtle
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@BrandyLJensen
54 count variety pack of Lays brand chips (regular, Cheetos, Nacho and Cool Ranch Doritos, BBQ, and Sour Cream and Onion) at Costco
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@AriannaRebolini
We fully walk out without the coat on lol. Funny how they are cold enough to put it on about half a block from our front door. 😂😂😂😂😂
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I'm going to write more about this later, but lots of people are asking if editors are still buying books now and having acquisitions meetings. They are! We'll need books in a year or two, and that's what we're working on now.
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More than 100 years ago, rejection letters were only a tiny bit more cordial. (A rejection letter to my great-great grandmother from the Ladies’ Home Companion, 1917.)
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Today I took a tour of Independence Hall and when the guide took out a print of The Declaration of Independence some guy behind me said “that’s what they stole in National Treasure.”
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I can’t believe Nike already made Mandarin Duck shoes
Lil Jupiter's Instagram feed showcases a post-normcore streetwear sensibility; seemingly, anything goes.
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Skyhorse doesn’t have that kind of cash.
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Say hello to Quinn McKean Landon! Isn't she the best already?
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I’m going to put SPINACH DIP in a BREAD BOWL like it’s 1996 up in here!!!!!!!!!
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Read the Year of Magical Thinking desperately on a plane when my dad was sick, like a how-to manual. It helped.
What's been your favorite reading experience? Not your favorite book, necessarily, but one of your favorite moments/periods of engagement with a book? Situations when the actual circumstances of reading it enhanced your appreciation of the book, or in some way proved memorable?
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Sending out more projects this week, but not to editors at
@harpercollins
. We support the
@hcpunion
strike. It's going to suck when Harper realizes they have big holes in their '24-5 lists & it'll to cost them SO MUCH $$$ to fill instead of just paying employees a living wage!
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NYC WE DIDN’T GET A MARATHON DAY. THIS IS OUR MARATHON DAY!! HIT THE STREETS!!!!!
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A curse of working in publishing is to read a book and fully see how the author conceptualized it and why an editor bought it but not particularly enjoy the reading experience of it. I’m never not looking at books on all those levels.
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A doctor just told me I can’t have seltzer or Diet Coke anymore. Thank you for your support during this trying time.
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Can someone make me a graph of the proliferation of open plan offices and the flu epidemic?
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@AlixEHarrow
Loooool!
Quinn learned about heart attacks at some point and said: “when I was a baby, I had 5 heart attacks.”
These kids I swear
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Writers, bookmark this for later (but read it now)! This is a list of those to thank in your acknowledgments. Tell me who I forgot in the comments.
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Happily will accept prayers/good vibes/whatever you got from about 7am - 11am ET tomorrow while I run my first (only!?) half marathon! 😬😬😬🏃♀️🏃♀️🏃♀️
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@alliartist
It sold enough books to earn back the amount of the original advance, and is now earning the author royalties
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This was scary to write. I couldn't have done it without
@nicole_soojung
. I hope this helps you if you need it.
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OMG I lost my wallet on the street in the last hour and 5 minutes ago I got an email from THE FINEST HUMAN ON THE PLANET who picked it up and is going to return it to me. THE UNIVERSE IS AMAZING THANK YOU THANK THANK YOU.
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"You're the only one taking queries at your agency" doesn't make me feel very special when you say that in your query letter. Just FYI.
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I hate that the pandemic has taken away one of my favorite activities: buying a bag of peanut M&Ms from a newsstand on the subway platform and eating them all myself while staring off into the middle distance.
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15 years ago this week I started at the Howard Morhaim Literary Agency. I've been so lucky to work at a place that's given me the most freedom paired with the most support.
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I’ve done 5 loads of laundry, edited 200 pages across several projects, and prepped 6lbs of tomatoes to make sauce tonight. Please clap a lot.
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Publishing twitter, if we don't get "B&N 25% OFF PRE-ORDERS" trending what are we even doing here
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Your publisher pushing back your book doesn't mean you aren't valuable to them. It could be that they literally can't get it printed in time. There are just TWO major printers in the US.
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Who can we pay to spread misinformation that the vaccines "detox" your cells or makes you lose 5 pounds or add 10 years to your life or eliminate free radicals? It doesn't have to be true, obviously. Maybe it would help.
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Boy howdy do people want to tell me I CAN run a marathon after I used that metaphor in The Outline article I wrote last week. Trust me, I cannot run a marathon, chiefly because I do not want to.
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Don’t let the lines deter you! If you waited for a cronut, you can wait in an early voting line.
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What twitter phrase makes the best contemporary literary novel title?
Wrong answers only
Thanks, I hate it
Wait for it
In this house we
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I'm running out of ways to say "I hope you are weathering the most recent turmoil as best you can" in business emails.
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I’m sorry but once you know this page of The Gruffalo is the perfect meter and rhyme to read like its 1980s rap, you’ll never not hear it.
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I did the mundane task that I did not want to do please clap
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OMG THIS THIS THIS
When editors and agents say they want to see something new, but all readers see is the same plot done over & over again, we don't really mean "a story wholly new," we mean not the low hanging fruit, the easy characterization, the expected plot, the cliche.
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It takes me exactly three clicks to make sure all your future emails skips my inbox forever and I will officially be doing that from now on if you send me a snarky, rude, or angry response to a rejection.
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@elongreen
I saw Bjork wearing a bright yellow jacket, a hot pink hat, white beats headphones, riding a bike down the street yesterday in Brooklyn Heights.
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