Donald Maass Literary Agency

The Bulletin: Inspired by a viewing of the 1996 film The First Wives Club, Ezra and his two best friends decide to get revenge on their terrible ex-boyfriends. Among the ensuing hijinks, Ezra anonymously uploads a TikTok video setting fire to his closeted ex’s letterman jacket, which quickly goes viral at their school. Further videos of school administrators enforcing their Watch What You Say initiative, which targets queer students and the expression of their identities, also go viral, and the trio begins […]

Dutch rights to New York Times bestselling author Martha Wells’ ALL SYSTEMS RED, ARTIFICIAL CONDITION, ROGUE PROTOCOL, and EXIT STRATEGY, the first four books in The Murderbot Diaries series, to De Fontein, by Vere Bank at Sebes & Bisseling in association with Michael Curry for Jennifer Jackson. French audio rights to LJ Andrews’s THE EVER KING, to Noa Rosen at Theleme, at auction, by Sarah Dray at Anna Jarota Agency, on behalf of Katie Shea Boutillier. Italian rights to Kate Heartfield’s THE TAPESTRY […]

Esquire: The latest work from the astonishingly prolific Mohamed (who has three books out this year alone) is a visceral yet intimate story about violence, nationalism, and war. Injured, captured, and tortured by his own side in an endless conflict, the famous pacifist Alefret is sent on a mission to infiltrate an enemy city. With him is Qhudur, a fanatic who will do anything for victory. Mohamed’s bio-technical setting is vivid and unusual—trained medical wasps, floating cities, and lightspiders dot […]

Mystery and Suspense Magazine: Kim Harrison is best known as one of the mainstays of the modern urban fantasy scene. Three Kinds of Lucky is only going to cement that reputation further, as she gets this new series started with a bang! There’s no shortage of books in the urban fantasy genre, and it’s such a delight to come across really original worlds, especially when they’re accompanied by a nice twisty plot and characters you really want to spend time with. There’s […]

Booklist: Little Badger returns to the world of her revelatory, award-winning debut, Elatsoe (2020). Seventeen-year-old Lipan Apache Shane and her mother, Lorenza, set out on a search-and-rescue mission to find two young siblings missing in Texas hill country. In this alternate 1970s America, fairy rings are transport centers. The missing seem to have stumbled on a group of dangerously unpredictable (and potentially world-destroying) mimic rings. They could be anywhere—and anytime. After Lorenza vanishes too, Shane undertakes her first solo rescue with […]

Kirkus: A Rhode Island teen who went from riches to rags when her parents divorced masterminds a scheme to get even with her father. After her mom leaves her philandering dad, 17-year-old Olivia Owens and her principled, loving mother are left broke. Swimming in medical debt after her exhausted mom falls asleep at the wheel in between jobs and is injured in a car crash, Olivia assembles a madcap cast of peers, plus a former teacher, each of whose skills […]

Washington Post: Fairies have starred in some terrific books of late, but in Mohamed’s novella they pack a lot more menace. In “The Butcher of the Forest,” the children of a despot known only as the Tyrant wander into an enchanted forest from which nobody has ever emerged, except a woman named Veris. Naturally, the Tyrant forces Veris to go rescue his kids, using her nimbleness to evade the snares and dangers in the woods, while grappling with the ethics […]

Congratulations to our DMLA authors who have been nominated for a 2023 Nebula Award! Nebula Award for Novel The Saint of Bright Doors, Vajra Chandrasekera (Tordotcom) Witch King, Martha Wells (Tordotcom) Nebula Award for Short Story “Tantie Merle and the Farmhand 4200“, R.S.A Garcia (Uncanny 7-8/23) “Author Martha Wells has graciously declined her nomination as a novel finalist this year for System Collapse published by Tordotcom. In 2022, Wells also declined a nomination for novella and felt that the Murderbot […]

THREE KINDS OF LUCKY by Kim Harrison is a USA Today Bestseller, debuting at #51!

New York Times: EXORDIA (Tordotcom, 532 pp., $29.99) is Seth Dickinson’s fourth novel and first work of science fiction, following three installments of the excellent Baru Cormorant fantasy series, and it revisits many of those novels’ themes and structures: empire, war and sacrifice. Set in 2013, “Exordia” is a first-contact story: Anna, a Kurdish survivor of genocide who is fostered in the United States, meets a many-headed snake alien named Ssrin in Central Park. Anna and Ssrin become friends and […]