Laurie Abkemeier

DeFiore and Company Literary Management

Laurie Abkemeier started her career in publishing more than thirty years ago and has been a literary agent with DeFiore and Company since 2003. Previously she was a senior editor at Hyperion, where she acquired and edited dozens of nonfiction books, including five New York Times bestsellers and many national bestsellers. As a former editor with extensive experience in what goes on behind publishers’ doors, she works closely with her authors to develop their ideas, polish their proposals, and guide them from deal to publication. She has represented more than a dozen New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestsellers. Laurie strives to maintain an eclectic list that spans history, science (physical, biological, and psychological), nature, sports, adventure, health and wellness, self-improvement, investigative journalism, big ideas, women’s studies, pop culture, and the offbeat. She is very interested in working with people of color and those from historically marginalized communities who are writing on these topics. Laurie is always open to queries; more than half of her authors have come to her via an unsolicited email query.

Submissions Open

Subject Focus

NF: Biography
NF: Business/Investing/Finance
NF: Health
NF: History/Politics/Current Affairs
NF: How-To
NF: Humor
NF: Illustrated/Art
NF: Lifestyle
NF: Narrative
NF: Pop Culture
NF: Reference
NF: Science
NF: Sports
NF: True Crime
NF: General/Other Non-Fiction
Non-Fiction: Advice/Relationships

Experience

20+

Years of Industry Experience

2005

Member Since

Submission Requirements

How to successfully present your work

Laurie Abkemeier accepts only email queries and only for nonfiction projects. Attachments will not be read unless requested. Snail mail queries will be discarded. Please include the word "QUERY" and your book title in the subject line, and send your brief query to Laurie@defliterary.com. Submissions need not be exclusive, and response time is generally between two hours and two weeks. If you have not heard anything during this time, please check that the defliterary.com domain name is on your email server whitelist; the response might have been rejected by your server. Please note that Laurie does not consider fiction queries of any kind.