Authors Lunch

Kindall Gant is a senior publicist at Phaidon. Prior to her current role, Kindall held a variety of positions at Hachette Book Group, Oxford University Press, Poets & Writers, and Artbook D.A.P. In addition to her full-time roles with trade, academic, and independent publishers, she has volunteered at Ugly Duckling Presse as a contributing editor and as a reader at a literary organization called The Word Works. In her free time, she writes poetry and creative nonfiction. You can find more about her writing at kindallgant.com. Her newly acquired book THE HARLEM TABLE is forthcoming from Phaidon. Tell us a […]

Best Offer Wins. (Celadon, Nov. 25, 2025. Editor: Ryan Doherty. Agents: Meredith Miller and Ethan Schlatter, UTA.) Marisa Kashino was a journalist for 17 years, most recently at The Washington Post. She spent the bulk of her career at Washingtonian magazine, writing longform features and overseeing the real estate and home design coverage. She grew up near Seattle, graduating from the University of Washington with a degree in journalism and political science. She lives in the D.C. area with her husband, two dogs, and two cats. Best Offer Wins is her first novel. How did you find your agent? I […]

Marietta Zacker has worked with books, authors and illustrators throughout her career—studying, creating, editing, marketing, teaching and selling. She supports independent bookselling, believes in libraries and takes pride in her work as a Latina in the world of publishing. She is always on the lookout for visual and narrative stories that reflect the world we live in, not the bubbles in which we put ourselves. She loves books that make readers feel and shies away from those that set out to teach the reader a lesson. What is your philosophy for representation when you take on a client? What questions […]

Middle Spoon. (Viking, September 9, 2025. Editor: Ibrahim Ahmad. Agent: Robert Guinsler, Sterling Lord Literistic.) Alejandro Varela’s debut novel, The Town of Babylon, was a finalist for the National Book Award. His short story collection, The People Who Report More Stress, was one of Publishers Weekly’s best works of fiction in 2023, a finalist for the International Latino Book Awards, and longlisted for the Aspen Literary Prize, the Story Prize, and the PEN/Jean Stein Book Award. Varela is an editor-at-large of Apogee Journal, holds a master’s degree in public health, and is based in New York. How did you find […]

Emily Ritter has over a decade of marketing experience working in-house at Simon & Schuster and Bloomsbury Children’s Books. Most recently she was the director of brand development for Sarah J. Maas and previously, the assistant director of digital marketing for teen books at Simon & Schuster, leading the Simon Teen brand. In 2024, she started Emily Ritter Digital Marketing to help more authors find accessible ways to promote themselves and their books online. What does a good social media presence look like for an author when they’re querying or just starting out? What about later in their career? While […]

Markus Redmond is an actor, director, screenwriter, and author. Known for his roles on Doogie Howser, MD, NYPD Blue, Murder One, Mad About You, Angel, and Fight Club, he wrote and starred alongside Whoopi Goldberg and Sharon Stone in the indie film If I Had Known I Was a Genius. He wrote, directed, and starred in the Amazon Prime thriller The 6th Degree, and has multiple screenplays in development. He lives in Los Angeles and Blood Slaves is his first novel. How did you find your agent? Specificity. I had been querying agents repping historical fiction without getting any bites. […]