Maria Whelan
InkWell Management
My Manuscript Wish List®
Maria graduated from University College Dublin with a BA in English and Drama, then obtained her Masters in Modern Literature from the University of Edinburgh. She moved from Dublin to New York in the hopes of pursuing a career in publishing. Before joining InkWell, she worked as a Foreign Rights Assistant at Janklow & Nesbit and interned at Akashic Books. Maria enjoys a blend of literary and commercial fiction, as well as speculative fiction and magical realism. She is particularly fond of novels that straddle the cultural divide. She is looking for books in the fiction and nonfiction space that speak to the current cultural moment or examine overlooked facets of society.
A few of my clients include Erin Mayer, Audrey Burges, Vinod Busjeet, Liz Topp, Luke Dumas, Dima Alzayat, Sarah Fay, Eduardo Garcia, and Tea Hacic-Vlahovic.
Fun facts about me:
I’m very good chugger – water, wine, beer. You name it. I am also double jointed.
Submission Guidelines
Submissions should be emailed to submissions@inkwellmanagement.com
Queries should be emailed to:
submissions@inkwellmanagement.com
In the body of your email, please include a query letter and a short writing sample (1-2 chapters). Emails with large attachments will be discarded. We currently accept submissions in all genres except screenplays. Due to the volume of queries we receive, we may not be able to respond to your query. If we are interested in reading more, we will respond within two months.
By submitting to InkWell Management, you agree to these terms.
No phone calls, please.
Vital Info
I’d like the next…
I’d love to find a book about O.C.D. and a book about Japan’s Rent-a-Family Industry. I would love to find a non-fiction book on a subversive section of people too!
I REALLY REALLY want a non-fiction book on funerary traditions or odd a book that examines peculiar customs revolving around death.
Always looking for novels that are slightly darker and have an edge to them, but not super downers. I would like to represent novels that have an element of genre, such as grounded speculative fiction or horror, but are accessible to a general reader.
Would like to find a project about The Loch Ness Monster. (I am terrified of it)
My favorites include…
As far as tone and content are concerned, I think Alissa Nuttings TAMPA is phenomenal. The wicked humor, laced throughout the novel, and the daring and fresh subject matter is precisely what I am looking for, I love the fresh, truncated, and daring prose found in A GIRL IS A HALF FORMED THING by Eimear McBride. I adore the dream-like qualities and deceiving simplicity employed by Hna Kang in THE VEGETARIAN. I am drawn to the strong sense of place and questions of friendship in THE BOOK OF GOOSE by Yiyun Li. The otherness and peculiarity in EILEEN by Ottessa Moshfegh stood out for me, as well as THE PISCES by Melissa Broder. I admired Katherine Heiny’s humor and pithy dialogue. The devastating subject matter and crisp language found in SMALL THINGS LIKES THESE by Claire Keegan make that book unforgettable. BIG SWISS by Jen Beagin is also a favorite, with her cutting sense of humor and racous wit. MY ABSOLUTE DARING is another favorite of mine for Gabriel Tallent’s ability to capture a complicated father-daughter relationship, coupled with a clear sense of place. Kevin Wilson’s NOTHING TO SEE HERE sticks out to me for its playfulness, outlandishness, and deft handling of neurodivergent children. LUSTER by Raven Leilani was utterly captivating in its depiction of hunger, longing, desire, pleasure, discomfort, pain, and alienation, in such a sleek form. TENDER IS THE FLESH by Agustina Bazterrica is a book i will never forget — that last line! So powerful and rattling! FRESH WATER FOR FLOWERS by Valerie Perrin is another favourite in the thought-provoking and beauty of the lanuage and story.
I love books that are a little left of field and weird.
