Agent Spotlight: Ginger Knowlton

This week’s Agent Spotlight features Ginger Knowlton of Curtis Brown, Ltd.
Status update on 5/12/2026: Ginger is no longer listed on the agency website, and I can't find any information on her status as an agent. I'll update Ginger's spotlight when I learn more information about her status.
About: “Ginger Knowlton represents a diverse list of authors and illustrators of picture books, middle-grade and young adult fiction and nonfiction. Her client list includes new and emerging writers as well as Newbery Medalists, Newbery and Printz Honor winners, Edgar and Lambda winners, New York Times bestsellers, and a host of other talented clients. Ginger has served on the Board of Directors of both the Association of Authors’ Representatives in NYC and the Friends of the Library in her hometown in Westchester County.” (Link)
What She's Looking For:
Picture book author-illustrators and middle grade and young adult fiction and nonfiction
What She Isn’t Looking For:
Stage plays, musicals, screenplays. (Link)
About the Agency:
“Curtis Brown, Ltd. is one of the world’s leading literary agencies, representing a wide variety of established and emerging authors of all genres since 1914. With seventeen agents in our New York, San Francisco and New Orleans offices, and a staff dedicated to handling dramatic, translation, audio and digital media rights, we provide the highest standard of literary representation in all aspects of our clients’ careers.” (Link)
Dislikes/Don’ts:
Unknown.
Editorial Agent:
Unknown
Web Presence:
Curtis Brown website
Publisher's Marketplace page
AgentQuery, QueryTracker

X

Instagram
Clients:
MJ Auch, Susan Campbell Bartoletti, Kelly Bingham, Kimberly Brubaker Bradley, Estate of Clyde Robert Bulla, Tina Burke, Nancy Etchemendy, Estate of Jean Craighead George, Peggy Gifford, Jenny Goebel, K.L. Going, Helen Frost, Francisco Jimenez, Ena Jones, Peg Kehret, Uma Krishnaswami, Gail Carson Levine, J.Patrick Lewis, Martine Leavitt, Nikki Loftin, Kekla Magoon, Wendy Mass, Estate of Eloise Jarvis McGraw, Hazel Mitchell, Todd Mitchell, Laurel Molk, Estate of Ogden Nash, Debbie Ridpath Ohi, Linda Sue Park, Mark Parsons, John Ritter, Barbara Roberts, Cynthia Leitich Smith, Dan Tavis, Stephanie Tolan, Wendelin Van Draanen, Sally Warner, , Jonah Winter, Ellen Wittlinger, Ellen Yeomans, Eve Yohalem
Query Methods:
E-mail: Yes.
Snail-Mail: No.
Online-Form: No.
Submission Guidelines (always verify):
Please send your query letter and contact information along with the first ten pages of your manuscript or art samples to gk@cbltd.com and she will respond only if she’s interested in seeing more, usually within four to six weeks. Please include “gkquery” (one word, exactly as written) in the subject line of your email. See the Curtis Brown website for complete, up-to-date submission guidelines.
Response Time:
Ms. Knowlton usually responds within  4 to 6 weeks if she's interested.
What's the Buzz?
Everything I found on Ms. Knowlton is very complimentary. Her 30+ years of experience, focus on children’s literature, and impressive clientele make her quite the catch for kidlit writers and illustrators. Her clients seem very pleased with her representation and are happy to praise her. She describes herself as being very picky but remains open and invested in submissions. 
Interviews:
Interview with Ginger Knowlton of Curtis Brown, Ltd at Mig W.riters (05/2012).
Interview with Ginger Knowlton with Krista Van Dolzer (07/2013)
Contact:
Please see the Curtis Brown website for contact and query information.
Profile Details:
Last updated: 3/28/2024 
Updated by Agent? Yes
Reviewed By Agent? 4/23/2019

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Have any experience with this agent? See something that needs updating? Please leave a comment or e-mail me at natalieiaguirre7@gmail.com
Note: These agent profiles and interviews presently focus on agents who accept children's fiction. Please take the time to verify anything you might use here before querying an agent. The information found here is subject to change.

Wednesday's Word Count & April Goal Review

We're heading into May this week. Do you know what that means? Goals are upon me! Not just weekly goals, monthly goals, and even some of my "long term" goals. June is just around the proverbial corner and then half the year will be over. Yowza! So today, I'm going to mix Wednesday's Words with my Monthly Goal Review (cause I'm running out of month and we have a Spotlight tomorrow).

Prior Goal: 4,000 words.

Achieved: 8,539 (can I get a woot, woot!?)

Goal for new week: 7,000.

Excuses / comments: "The end" is in my field of vision and I'm amped! Of course, this particular "the end" will only lead to "the beginning" of massive revisions BUT, I'm still excited. I also challenged Heather with a deadline. We're to have to our respective drafts done by May 15th (the same drafts we worked on for the 30k challenge). We both need it, and if I can manage it, it will fall in line perfectly with my 2009 goal to have a complete draft done by May or June. What does it all mean? I have to write around 17k over the next 16 days. Given my track record with other challenges, I know I can do it.

Now for my review...

April:

Still on track to have my WIP finished by the end of May.
Still on track for my end-of-year goals.
Read seven books.
Blogged regularly.
Finished the 30k in 30 (one) days challenge on time.
Practiced reading outloud.
Reviewed my goals for April!

What didn't I accomplish?

I didn't manage to write daily, as hoped, but I've still done very well, I think.
I didn't do a book review STILL.
I didn't post a teaser.

So for May I charge myself with the following:

Finish this draft by May 15th, which will cover one of my year goals.
Begin revisions.
Read at least three books.
Write at least three Fashy Fiction prompts (I'm awful about this and awful at it).
At least one book review.
Maybe that teaser I keep talking about.
AND...the usual, i.e. blogging, commenting, learning, etc.

Woo! Glad that's over with. Please sift through all this madness as you please and add your own goals - weekly, monthly, yearly, whatev! If you'd rather just answer a question, what have you been doing this spring? How's your weather been?

So Tell Me: Audiobooks Vs. Reading

When you listen to an audio book, do you consider the book read? How do you view the experience of the different formats? As an author or aspiring author, would you prefer readers to read your novel(s) in text as intended, or have you no preference?

I'm exceedingly curious about this, but I have to admit that I'm not a good candidate for the discussion. I generally don't listen to audiobooks. The few times I have, I found the experience surprisingly different. The book is usually read in a different rhythm than I would read it. I don't have the time to pause and speculate over things, feel the words, like I normally might. I can't study the structure, etc. It's certainly an enjoyable experience in that it brings other unique elements to the table but I can't bring myself to say I've read a book that I've only listened to on audio. For me, the experience is much more enjoyable if I've actually, physically read the book first.

Let's discuss! What are you thoughts and opinions?

Agent News: Two New Agents @ Golblatt Literary

Putting this up later than I meant to but I thought I'd still post in case anyone missed it!

Barry Goldblatt Literary is now home to two new agents, Beth Fleisher and Joe Monti. The Goldblatt web site has been relaunched to reflect its new crew and I'm excited to report both new agents will be living up to the Goldblatt standard and focusing their energies on kidlit!

An excerpt from the press release on the Goldblatt blog: “I’m thrilled to be growing the agency,” says Barry Goldblatt. “At a time when there’s a lot of doom and gloom out there, I’m optimistic about the future, and I thought what better way to show that than by expanding? And to be able to do so with smart, talented people like Joe and Beth sends the confident message that bigger and better things are ahead.”

You can read this and the rest of the press release HERE.


What are the new additions looking for?

Beth Fleisher:

"I'm particularly interested in finding new voices in middle grade and young adult fantasy, science fiction, mysteries, historicals and action adventure as well as select children's and adult non-fiction. I welcome both prose and graphic novel formats."

Joe Monti:

"As an agent I'll be focusing on children's and young adult, or teen literature, as well as some adult genre fiction. I'm also interested in working with folks who are writer-artists of graphic works, from graphic novels to picture books. Specifically I love work that breaks new ground, a work that is subversive or enlightening by utilizing a different approach.

"I'm also an unabashed lover of genre fiction, particularly fantasy and science fiction. I'm also looking for cultural diversity as I come from a mixed race family, and my son is an even bigger mutt than I am. And lastly, I'm a big beleiver that the widely held beleif 'boys over a certain age do not read' is nonsense. Guys read, especially if they have a range of materials to read from that interests and speaks to them."

Good luck friends! I hope to hear of at least one of you getting signed. ; )

Book Give Away @ Writing it Out

I know we all love a good book giveaway!

Head on over to Beth Revis' blog, Writing it Out, for a chance to win one of two sets of books she's giving away. Both sets look great! All you have to do is choose, and there are extra opportunities for points if you wish to take advantage of them.

(Also, read some of her "Today in Class" posts - they're hilarious!)

Good luck! The give-away post can be found HERE.

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One more thing. Heather needs some questions to answer for her web site. If you could stop by her blog post HERE and throw some at her (feel free to peg her with some funny ones), that would be great!

Lit Soup's Birthday and Contest

First off, today is the 3rd Birthday of agent Jenny Rae Rappaport's blog, Lit Soup. She's celebrating by having a microfiction contest!

The rules: here.
The "magic" word and contest thread: here.
And make sure to stop by this post and say Happy Birthday to the blog!

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Setting that bit of fun aside, what do you think of the new layout? Be honest. Too dark? Did you like the old one better? I'd really like to know!

Excuse the Mess

I'm changing up my template today. Please excuse any intermittent changes and issues there might be throughout the day. I have to fix some formatting and replace all my widgets.

Thanks!!