Submissions: open

Lisa Leshne

The Leshne Agency – Owner, Literary Agent

leshneagency.com

LISA LESHNE has been in the media and entertainment business for 30+ years. Her broad experience greatly informs her work as a literary agent. Arriving in Czechoslovakia as a 22-yr-old backpacker in 1990, months after the Velvet Revolution, Lisa stayed and co-founded The Prague Post, the largest English-language newspaper in Central Europe, along with its book division and website. Lisa served as the newspaper’s Publisher for over a decade. She subsequently worked for Accenture, Dow Jones, The Wall Street Journal, the Partnership for New York City’s Financial Recovery Fund, and Ink2. Prior to founding The Leshne Agency, Lisa began her career as a literary agent at LJK Literary in 2008. Lisa’s clients include a diverse list of #1 New York Times bestselling, Pulitzer and Polk award-winning, and debut authors across many genres. She is always on the lookout for new authors she and her colleagues can work with to develop their ideas into solid and compelling manuscripts. She is most passionate about narrative and prescriptive non-fiction, especially on social justice, sports, health, wellness, business, pop-culture, political, and parenting topics. She loves memoirs that transport the reader into another person’s head and give a voyeuristic view of someone else’s extraordinary experiences. Lisa is also interested in acquiring literary and commercial fiction, as well as exceptional young adult, middle-grade, and children’s books that take the reader on a journey and are just plain fun to read. Originally from Champaign, Illinois, Lisa has a BA from the University of California, Santa Barbara and an MBA from Harvard Business School. She lives in Manhattan.

Subject Focus

  • Fiction Debut
  • New Adult
  • General Fiction
  • Fiction Literary
  • Non Fiction Biography
  • Non Fiction Business Investing Finance
  • Non Fiction Health
  • Non Fiction History Politics Current Affairs
  • Non Fiction Humor
  • Non Fiction Illustrated Art
  • Non Fiction Lifestyle
  • Non Fiction Memoir
  • Non Fiction Narrative
  • Non Fiction Parenting
  • Non Fiction Pop Culture
  • Non Fiction Religion Spirituality
  • Non Fiction Sports
  • Non Fiction General Other Non Fiction
  • Childrens Middle Grade Fiction
  • Childrens Middle Grade Non Fiction
  • Childrens Young Adult Fiction
  • Childrens Young Adult Non Fiction

Experience

30+

Years of Industry
Experience

2015

Member Since

Submission Requirements

All submissions should be submitted through Query Tracker to get the fastest response, OR emailed with your query letter to submissions@leshneagency.com. Please do not do both. For emails, please put the word QUERY as the first word in the Subject line of your email followed by the title of your proposed book. This will help us to better keep track of your submission. For all submissions, we prefer a Word document, easy to read 12-point font, double-spaced. This is not a requirement, but it does make it easier for us to read, and we appreciate it. For Non-Fiction: Please summit a complete book proposal, including an overview of the book; a table of contents and detailed chapter outline; the book’s target audience; marketing or promotional plans; four to six recently published titles you would compare your book to and why; your bio; and at least two fully-written sample chapters. See the Proposal Guide on The Leshne Agency’s website for a more detailed description of what we like to see in a book proposal: https://leshneagency.com/submissions/ For Fiction: Please tell us about yourself (the more complete, the better – we want to know about you!), and include the title, genre, word count, a hook or tag-line, and a brief synopsis of your manuscript. If there is something in particular that inspired you to write your book, we want to know about it. You want to catch and hold our attention and make us want to read more. You can also give us some comp titles (see point #4 below) of books that you think are similar to yours in tone, genre, and/or audience appeal. You can just give us a sentence or two, there is no need to write a paragraph for each comp title you pick. Please include 10-20 sample pages. We will request more if we are interested. If we are interested in your project, we will get in touch to request you send us more sample chapters or the full manuscript for consideration. We consider every query carefully, but due to the large volume of submissions, it may take us up to two months to review your submission. Regrettably, due to the volume of submissions, we are unable to respond if we are not interested. Rest assured, you WILL hear from us if we ARE interested.

My Links

Speaking Volumes: Lisa Leshne’s Top Book Picks
20 Questions Answered by Literary Agent Lisa Leshne
“It was an incredible period”: 1991 launch of Prague Post remembered