Monster List of Picture Book Agents--Sean McCarthy, Sean McCarthy Literary Agency

11/10/2013 - Sean McCarthy has opened his own agency, Sean McCarthy Literary. Please see his agency website mccarthylit.com for his current info and submission guidelines.

1/10/2014 - I am represented by Sean McCarthy! You can read my announcement, Once Upon a Time a Writer Found the Perfect Agent.  You can also read a bit about my agent journey in my post, How I Found the Right Agent for Me on the Sub It Club blog.

Sean McCarthy is an agent at the Sheldon Fogelman Agency. His bio states that he is "actively looking to build his client list" along with a little bit of what he is looking for in picture books. Here are some more links to help you decide if Sean might be a good match for you and your work:

Best to read this  interview at Mother. Write. Repeat. first off. Sean says, “In order to consider a picture-book writer, I'd like to see at least three manuscripts, or work in different genres (e.g. middle grade).” He also talks about word count and what types of stories he’d like to see.

Tara Lazar posted her notes from an agent chat session with Sean.  So did Kathy Temean: http://kathytemean.wordpress.com/2009/04/04/sean-mccarthy-assistant-agent-sheldon-fogelman-agency/

JM Tohline has a great blogpost titled The Biggest Mistakes Writers Make When Querying Literary Agents. He asked around 100 agents this question. Sean McCarthy was one of the agents that responded. If you scroll down a bit there is a paragraph from Sean but the entire piece is definitely worth reading.

It looks like response may vary depending on if you e-sub or snail sub. It also looks like Sean may not respond unless interested from these few comments on Querytracker. Good to be aware of. But I did find a response time at the Absolute Write Water Cooler which I will paste here since you have to scroll down to find it, "queried Sean on 1/31, and got a snail rejection dated 4/7." See the Sheldon Fogelman Agency submission guidelines for the best info.

You can find Sean McCarthy on Twitter @sean_j_m

Sean represents author Jamie Swenson who has sold three picture books since signing on with Sean.

BIG RIG - Disney-Hyperion fall 2013, illustrated by Ned Young

BOOM BOOM BOOM - FS&G - spring 2013 illustrated by David Walker

IF YOU WERE A DOG - FS&G – pub date TBA, illustrated by Chris Raschka

Wow! Way to go Jamie & Sean!

This post is part of the Monster List of Picture Book Agents. If you have any changes that you think should be made to this listing, please contact me or leave them in the comments. Thanks!