ALL ABOUT PITCH SESSIONS

WHO'S TAKING PITCHES

Pitch session requests open on Monday, April 28th at Noon Eastern/9 am Pacific and close on Sunday May 4th at Noon Eastern. Pitch sessions will be held on Saturday, June 14th, at Noon Eastern, location TBD.

What Is a Pitch?

A pitch is a concise, engaging description of your project meant to pique the interest of the person to whom you are pitching your story. Make your pitch short—two or three sentences at most—and be prepared to answer questions.

What Should I Pitch?

Pitch finished projects. Do not pitch ideas. Make sure your work is error-free and ready to submit. If someone shows interest in your work, they will ask you to submit it once StokerCon has ended.

To Whom Should I Pitch?

Choose pitch takers who actually represent your project. If you’ve written a Young Adult Horror novel, make sure the person/people to whom you want to pitch represent/publish YA Horror. This is a critical part of the pitch process—do your homework before you decide to whom you wish to pitch. You have one shot with this person. Make sure it counts.

How Do Pitch Sessions Work?

There are a limited number of pitch sessions for each publisher, editor, or agent assigned on a first-come, first-served basis, in the order the requests are received. When you preregister for a pitch session, list up to three of your preferred pitch takers. This helps your chances to get at least one of your favored choices.

How To Register For A Pitch Session

Please email gonnhirr3382@gmail.com with your top three choices. In the Subject Line, put STOKERCON 2025 PITCH SESSION. Any pitch requests received before the date and time listed above will be discarded, as will any received after the closing time. You will be notified by email the names and times of the persons to whom you will pitch.

Please note we receive roughly forty pitch requests in the first five seconds of the open registration period. If you only list one person to whom you would like to pitch, you may not get any pitches.

Alec Shane

Alec Shane majored in English at Brown University, a degree

he put to immediate use by moving to Los Angeles after

graduation to become a professional stunt man. Realizing that

he prefers books to breakaway glass, he moved to New York

City in 2008 to pursue a career in publishing. Alec quickly

found a home at Writers House Literary Agency, where he

was able to carve out a niche as the agency's go-to guy for

horror. In the horror genre specifically, Alec would love to

learn about monsters, legends, and evils from other cultures;

he's not opposed to the occasional vampire or demon story,

but that isn't his focus right now. He's also on the lookout for

a female serial killer (or just female villains in general), haunted

houses, abandoned asylums, and towns harboring secrets. In juvenile horror, if it's fast-paced and features a group of kids biting off more than they can chew - not to mention creepy crawlies that can just as easily chew them - he's in. On the nonfiction side, Alec would love to see humor, biography, history (particularly military history), true crime, “guy” reads, and all things sports. In fiction, Alec is looking for mystery, thrillers (though he’s experiencing terrorist fatigue at the moment), suspense, historical fiction, literary fiction, and middle-grade and young adult fiction. He doesn’t want Romance, straight sci-fi, high fantasy, picture books, self-help, women’s fiction, food, or travel memoir.

Becky LeJeune

Becky LeJeune is an agent at Bond Literary Agency, a

Denver-based agency run by Sandra Bond. Prior to joining

the agency, Becky spent time working as a bookseller, a

freelance cookbook editor, and an acquisitions editor for a

small, regional press. She is a graduate of the Denver

Publishing Institute. Becky is interested in cookbooks and

YA and adult submissions in the following genres: horror,

mystery/suspense/thriller, historical fiction, sci fi, fantasy, and

general fiction. She enjoys plot driven narratives with unique

settings, strong world building, and well-developed characters.

Bradley Englert

Bradley Englert is an Executive Editor at Run For It, the new

horror imprint from Orbit Books. He’s worked with horror

authors Craig DiLouie, Andy Marino, Nicholas Pullen, and

Jen Julian. He is now looking forward to building Run For It

into a premiere destination for diehard horror readers. He

has also edited numerous New York Times bestsellers and

has the privilege of working with authors like James S. A.

Corey, Brent Weeks, Joe Abercrombie, Andrzej Sapkowski,

Riot Games, M. R. Carey, and many, many more. Bradley is

looking for the logline, quick hook, and why the author is

excited about their book (rather than a longer, plot-driven

pitch). I’m primarily looking for horror, but I also acquire for

the Orbit list, so I acquire fantasy and science fiction as well.

Cherry Weiner

Cherry Weiner grew up in Australia, lived in Europe for three

and a half years and moved to American when she married

her husband, Jack in 1972. She has been agenting since 1977,

when she left the Robert P. Mills Agency, Mills’ famous clients

(she will not any drop further names, but might tell you about

it, if you ask her), took two years to convince her to open her

own agency. They did this by inundating her with new authors

and their manuscripts. She started out by handling science

fiction, fantasy, and horror. She now handles all genres of

fiction and a good number of fairly well-known authors in the

field of Horror, Science Fiction / Fantasy, Romance, Mystery,

Westerns, Native American novels and Historical novels covering all the various genres each category can break out into. Only once in a very special situation has non-fiction crept into the mix but no poetry, no children’s fiction and almost no Young Adult works. If there is Y.A., then it is science fiction, fantasy or horror, and only by the authors she already handles in adult fiction. What Cherry is looking for... the author to tell her there is a complete manuscript - word count - single title or series, and then we talk about the actual work(s).

Christopher Paul

Christoph Paul is the singer/songwriter of Goth Rock band

The Dionysus Effect, he is the EIC of CLASH Books, and an

award-winning author represented by Inkwell. Christoph am

looking for horror with a hook and a heart. Style is important

to him so he searches for a strong voice-driven narrative--the

first paragraph of the book is strongly encouraged to have

with the pitch. Genre mashups are welcome along with

existential themes.

Emma Cole

Emma Cole is an editor Harlequin. She acquires romantic

suspense and mysteries for Harlequin Intrigue and horror and

speculative fiction for HTP Books. She volunteers as the

Poetry Editor for Orion’s Belt magazine and occasionally

reads for Skull & Laurel magazine. She’s currently focused on

the intersection of romance and horror and has published a

number of nonfiction articles focusing on romance in horror

films. What I want to hear from a pitch: I’m interested in horror

fiction that skirts the edge between genres; speculative stories

with a focus on character and setting over extensive

world-building; and mysteries with a touch of the Weird. If it’s

got a romantic element, I want to know whether there’s a HEA (Happily Ever After). What I don’t want to hear from a pitch: I’m not acquiring dark fantasy or fairy tale retellings, extreme horror, or science fiction without underlying horror elements.

Michael Dolan

Michael Dolan is a writer and editor with over 25 years of

experience at the highest levels of publishing. In addition to

being the author of several books, he has served as executive

editor for many publishing companies, including Condé Nast.

As the founder of Winding Road Stories. Michael has worked

with both experienced and emerging authors to hone their

craft and fulfill the vision of their storytelling. Winding Road

Stories is looking for diverse authors who weave imaginative

and ambitious horror stories suitable for print and the screen.

We only work with original, unpublished completed work in

both novella and novel form. Winding Road Stories currently

publishes the original work of over a dozen horror authors,

and we are always looking to add creative and talented people to our author family. For more information on what we do, please visit windingroadstories.com. What we are looking for in a pitch: A story with an easy to describe and understand premise and strong themes.What we are not looking for in a pitch: A long description of the story plot.

Arley Sorg

ARLEY SORG is an associate agent at kt literary. He is

interested in speculative and fantastic works for adults,

including horror. He may be interested in YA titles. He is

often drawn to books with layers, stories with some kind of

meaning, authors with something to say. What that looks like

can vary greatly. For pitches? Try to relax. This is not your

only shot. Think about what is cool, interesting, and special

about your work. Convey an idea of what the book does and

how it does it: what is the actual story. Besides agenting,

Arley is also co-Editor-in-Chief of Fantasy Magazine, Senior

Editor and film reviewer at Locus, and more. He is a two-time