Amy Stern has been at the Sheldon Fogelman Agency since 2010, working her way up from agent assistant to taking on her own clients. After developing her passion for children’s and young adult work while studying creative writing and English at Bryn Mawr College, she got masters’ degrees in children’s literature and library science at Simmons College, where she learned how to critically analyze children’s books. Her eight years in publishing have taught her how to read them with an eye for marketability as well.
Amy is interested in a wide range of books for audiences between birth and 18 years, but is particularly keen to find projects that respect the agency and humanity of the child reader through portraying characters that reflect their lives, no matter how mundane or fantastical they may be.
We asked Amy what she’s looking for in picture books. Here’s what she had to say:
“More than anything, I want a story featuring a character that I can get to know even within a short text (it hopefully goes without saying that a picture book should be less than 800 words!), and I want to see that character grow over the course of the story in an organic way. I like things that are weird, but I need that weirdness to be grounded in an understanding of the structure of picture books; it can’t just be haphazard. I want to read manuscripts that tell a coherent story but leave room for the art to make that story whole.”
