In 2017, after ten years of being a literary agent, I turned the tables and sent out a query letter to other agents about a picture book I wrote called Bright Lights, Big Kitty. Turns out, querying is just as nerve-racking as writers say! Years later I looked at that letter again as I gathered ideas for what would become my first book for adults, Write Through It: An Insider’s Guide to Publishing and the Creative Life (Simon Element, 2025), and couldn’t believe what I had sent out. I told agents about all the other books I wanted to write, including a YA novel loosely based on the movie The Apartment and a series of board books featuring Halloween characters and baby milestones (Dracula’s First Tooth, etcetera). None of those books were even written, and I spent longer explaining them than the manuscript I had ready to go. I was worried that agents would think I was only a picture-book author, when I wanted to write all kinds of other things, too. I landed an agent, luckily, so that superfluous paragraph didn’t wreck my chances, but he has never asked me about those books, and I’m glad for it. I never wrote them. Today I wouldn’t have the same qualms about being only a picture-book author—but I can recognize just how anxious I was about my place in the world as a writer.
I get many questions from up-and-coming writers who don’t know which agents to query if they want to write in multiple genres. Who do they send to if they’ve got a mystery ready to go but are drafting a YA novel, too? Do they approach agents who do both? Just one genre? Do they eventually get two agents? What if a mystery agent loves their book but doesn’t do any YA? Here are the most common questions I get from authors looking to work in multiple genres and the answers I would give them as a literary agent. I definitely could have used some of this advice myself back when I was sending out my first queries.
Do I need two agents?
You only need two agents if your first one doesn’t work at all in the other genre(s) you want to write in, but that doesn’t have to be your first order of business. This is actually a really good problem to have. Focus first on finding an agent for the book that’s finished. When you speak with one, ask if they represent work in the other genre(s) and how they handle clients who write in multiple genres. Most will say, “I’m happy to talk to you about any book you want to write, and I’ll let you know if I don’t think I’d be a good fit for something, and we can take it from there.” This arrangement may feel too loosey-goosey for some writers, but this kind of response is a signal that an agent puts your needs first. They’re saying, “I prioritize helping you. If I can’t help you with a particular book, I may be able to connect you to someone who can.” If, when you have that first conversation with an agent, you discover this person wouldn’t handle all the kinds of writing you want to do, you can also absolutely say, “No, thank you” to them and find an agent who will. That said, I have a few clients I represent for one genre and who work with another agent in another genre. This works out just fine. Overall it’s okay to ask prospective agents questions about the possible shape of your whole career—but you may not need to do anything about it until that career is underway.
What if my current agent doesn’t represent my new genre?
If you are already represented and now realize you want to work in a new genre, talk to your agent. Tell them about your idea. Ask them if they have experience in that area. Discuss it together, like the team that you are. Some agents will be excited to dive into a new genre and learn right along with you. Some may have sold a dozen books in that area and you hadn’t even realized it. And others will tell you if that genre is out of their depth. Trust your agent to be honest with you—and be honest with them, too.
Does writing in multiple genres help or hurt my chances of getting an agent?
Some authors think that if they present themselves as a veritable vending machine of books (cough, me, cough) agents will want to sign them up right away. The truth is it’s hard to sell one book, never mind many in different genres, either at the same time or in succession. I think most agents assume their clients will want to try new things and are happy to go on that journey with them over the course of their entire career. But agents aren’t looking for a jack-of-all-trades (and a master of none).
Will I get pigeonholed?
Writers are similarly worried that if they focus too narrowly in one genre they’ll get pigeonholed, that if they don’t mention they are interested in memoir or literary fiction, then the agents they query with their YA fantasy will never think of them otherwise. This is why it’s always a good idea to talk to your agent about your overall goals, whether you’ve been working with them for years or mere weeks; you can absolutely bring this up on your first call. If you’re worried about getting pigeonholed, talk to your agent about it. They’ve probably had similar conversations with other clients, and they’ll have either wise words to soothe your worries or actionable strategies to prevent that from happening. If you don’t have an agent yet, try not to worry about this. As my grandma always said, “Don’t borrow trouble.” You may not actually have this problem at this point in your career.
Do I need a pen name? Two social media profiles?
Many authors think that if they want to write in multiple genres, they need multiple pen names. Sometimes this can be a useful strategy—but to be honest it’s often more trouble than it’s worth. If you’re writing in two genres that would work against each other, such as erotica and picture books, it is likely useful to have two different writing profiles. If you want to keep your historical romance work separate from your scholarly monographs, that makes sense too. But I think the most useful thing here is to ask why you want to keep them separate. Will your books in one genre suffer if they’re linked to your work in another? Do you need to use a pseudonym for professional or safety reasons? Those are some good reasons to use a pen name; the assumed ease of keeping your work in separate boxes is not. In fact, it’s harder to manage multiple pseudonyms, especially if the point is to keep them very separate. Do you really want to post twice as much on social media? Maintain two websites and e-mail addresses? Remember who you are when talking to different readers? And wouldn’t it be great if the fans of your romantic thrillers picked up your historical mysteries, and vice versa? It’s wonderful if the platform you’ve built with one name on your book jackets can support your other books, too. Sometimes there are good reasons to use a pen name, but those reasons apply to a much smaller portion of writers who work in multiple genres than you think.
Won’t writing books in one genre boost the profile of my books in another?
Maybe. But think about how you, as a reader, view writers who publish in multiple genres. Let’s say you have a favorite contemporary romance author and they just came out with a YA novel. How excited are you to read it? You may be really excited, because you love this author and/or you also read YA. Or you may think, “Huh, I’ve never read YA. I’ll have to check it out.” But some readers will think, “Why would I read a YA novel if I’m not a teenager?” (Those people would be wrong, of course, but they’re allowed to have their opinions.) You as a reader don’t read just one genre to the exclusion of all others. But you also don’t read every genre, because who has the time? If you’re just starting out in your career, I would not envision a fifty-book career path starting at picture books and ending with cozy mysteries featuring grandmas solving crimes, aimed at using each book to boost the sales of the next. I also would not spend valuable writing time trying to construct a Rube Goldberg–esque publication plan that would propel your fans from one genre to the next. Focus on that first book, and then worry about the second.
But how can I plan ahead for this?
You can plan ahead for writing in multiple genres by reading and writing in multiple genres. Read widely and pay attention to the genres that interest you most. For one, you’ll get to read some great books, and you’ll also get to play around in worlds you might not get to otherwise. Curious about nonfiction books? Write one! Maybe the biography of that famous person from your hometown you’re working on while your literary novel is on submission might come to something one day. If not you still got to meet some very colorful local characters and learned about using historical documents for future research. And maybe that comes in handy in a book or two for a new mystery series you talk to your agent about. All writing is good writing, even the stuff that doesn’t result in a book contract. Follow what you’re interested in. Who knows where it will lead?
In my experience, as an author and a literary agent, most writers come to the question of “how do I write all the books I want to write?” from a place of anxiety. “What if I don’t get to write my picture book?” “What if I sell a nonfiction book first and no one pays attention to my novel?” “Will writing one book hurt my chances of writing another?” And as those of us who’ve read enough self-help know, worrying doesn’t do much when it comes to controlling the future. In fact, we can’t do that any better than we can control whether an agent or editor likes our first book or our tenth. What we can control is what we work on, what we enjoy working on, and talking to the publishing professionals in our lives (or the ones to come) about how to reach our goals. We all just want good books in the end, don’t we? So go write them. We can’t wait to see what you come up with.
Kate McKean is a literary agent and an author. Her most recent book is the children’s picture book Pay Attention to Me!, out from Sourcebooks Jabberwocky (2026).
Thumbnail credit: Jamie Magnifico