Erika DiPasquale

I have a wide range of tastes and interests and am open to projects for all age ranges, from board book through YA. Working with BIPOC creators and creators of marginalized identities is a priority for me. I’d love to see anything that plays with form and stretches readers’ minds regarding how stories can be told. Anything described as humorous, silly, quirky, clever, or unconventional is likely up my alley. Yet at the same time, the reason I pursued a career in children’s books is because I love how books for kids 0-18 can tackle very difficult topics in accessible and digestible ways. Here are some specific categories that I’d love to see in my inbox, though I am also open to anything that may surprise me.

• Stories in all age ranges told with innovative storytelling structures. For illustrated books, this may look like interactive or novelty formats, or creative ways that the text and images work together, etc. or a structure we’ve never seen before. For novels, this may look like mixed medium, backwards timelines, rotating perspectives, etc. or a structure we’ve never seen before.
• Chapter books and early middle grade with quirky characters like The Amazing Days of Abby Hayes.
• Speculative fiction in the vein of Adam Silvera.
• Afterworld stories, like Elsewhere and Everlost and the shows The Good Place and Upload.
• Commercial thrillers in the vein of A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder, Sadie, and Karen M. McManus.
• Retellings of classic books/stories, history etc., in the vein of My Lady Jane, The Bird and the Blade, and Where I End and You Begin.
• Empowering, boundary-pushing non-fiction for all age ranges, particularly anything about climate change, food revolution, disability, and mental health. I’d especially love a period revolution middle grade.
• Queer characters of all intersections, especially asexual characters in all age ranges.
• Disabled characters, neurodiverse characters, and characters with chronic diseases of all intersections in all age ranges.
• Body positive and fat positive stories in all age ranges.

Submission Guidelines

Submissions should be emailed to erika.dipasquale@harpercollins.com

Unfortunately, HarperCollins doesn’t accept unagented submissions.

Agents, please email submissions to me at HarperCollins.