Welcome to Rising Tides Writers, a community of 1.9k aspiring and published writers. I’m Caroline Madden, author of The Marriage Vendetta (2025 HarperCollins/Bonnier) and The Village (April 2027). It took me more than a decade to get my first book deal and in this newsletter I’m sharing all the things I wish I’d known back when I was getting buried under rejections.
Greetings, writers! Please forgive any typos in today’s newsletter. They are most likely definitely due to the unprofessional quantity of prosecco I indulged in earlier when my parents came over for a little celebratory tipple.
What can I say? It’s been an exciting week and so I made the executive decision to raid my ‘writer’s solace corner’ 👇
A friend of mine who is a brilliant children’s writer once told me that she always keeps a bottle of Champagne in her fridge in case of anything good happening writing-wise. It’s a sort of motivator. I always loved that idea, so my prosecco corner is my version!
So yeah, there’s a potentially exciting long-shot kinda thing brewing, but when I fell down the inevitable Reddit (where else?) rabbit hole trying to figure out what it all might mean, I came across a writer with a beautiful attitude. They said: no matter what’s going on, a writer’s only job is to create something beautiful. (Wait, so it’s not our job to stay up half the night fixating on things that are beyond our control?!?)
This writer said that they imagine themselves in a garden surrounded by high walls (keeping out all the outside noise of literary agents, editor interest, film stuff, whatever it may be), and their one and only job is to make that garden beautiful.
I thought how lovely… and then obviously I turned to alcohol🍾🤣
Anyway! Time to stop rambling.
If you’re querying, you need to know about Lauren Khan. She’s an up-and-coming agent, having joined FinePrint Literary Management in 2025.
And to coincide with getting this essay published in Business Insider, Lauren has reopened to queries, woohoo!
You might know Lauren from the Prose Pros podcast that she co-hosts with her friend and fellow agent Tali Shammas (Storm Literary). A former New York corporate lawyer, Lauren comes across as super-sharp, extremely driven and someone who won’t give up on you. What writer wouldn’t love that?
Lauren is particularly interested in adult and YA commercial fiction, especially women’s fiction, romance, mysteries, and thrillers, as well as select non-fiction titles.
You can query her here. Go go go!
This post might be worth saving so you can come back to it as a reference in the future.
The Shit No-one Tells You About Writing ( The Shit About Writing Team) with Carly Watters, Cecilia Lyra and Bianca Marais
Publishing Rodeo with Sunyi Dean and Scott Drakeford (worth listening to even just for Scott’s laugh)
#AmWriting with Jennie Nash (I was honoured to record an episode with Jennie recently — it was a true highlight as Jennie’s book, Blueprint for a Book, changed my writing life!)
The Prose Pros (as mentioned above)
The Writer’s Identity podcast with Stéphanie de Geus (I’m delighted to be going on this podcast soon)
The Sophia Chang Show: Books. Biceps. No BS. — Sophia Chang is a Reese’s Book Club LitUp author with a 100% request rate on her query letter… and she is also hilarious. We had a zoom chat this week and some serious craic* was had.
(*Irish term for having a laugh. In no way related to drugs. Quite often related to alcohol.)
Katie Shea Boutillier and her assistant Rachel Saylor — the Donald Maass Literary Agency (Katie and Rachel are my agents and they have been brilliant - SO responsive 🫶)
Lauren Khan
Sara O’Keeffe (Andrew Nurnberg Associates, currently closed)
Jenna Satterthwaite (currently closed)
Ali Lake — O’Connor Literary (currently closed)
And don’t CeCe and Carly from TSNOTYAW sound so great?
There are so many more that I love — I’ll keep adding them here as I remember them!
As well as working as a literary agent, Lauren Khan is also an agented author. Her query letter got her 47 full requests!
Here’s the query letter that got me my third agent
Andrea Bartz has created an incredible directory of successful query letters here
Lauren Neely’s virtual book club with special author guests
I’ve recently joined the Dublin chapter of the Difficult Women Book Club network. DWBC is a global network - just google it/search on Instagram to find your local chapter.
Story Genius courses by Lisa Cron on www.creativelive.com — life-changingly brilliant
Story Genius by Lisa Cron
Blueprint for a Book by Jennie Nash
The Science of Storytelling by Will Storr
Writing the Breakout Novel workbook by Donald Maass
Into the Woods by John Yorke
Story by Robert McKee
The Anatomy of Story by John Truby
Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott
On Writing by Stephen King
Save the Cat! by Blake Snyder (just don’t admit to people you’ve read this, they will think less of you!)
Writing Down the Bones by Natalie Goldberg
The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron
Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert
Powerscourt Springs Health Farm — I personally guarantee* that you will get an idea for a new book and at least 3,000 words written if you stay at this absolute slice of heaven in Wicklow, the garden of Ireland.
(*Note: definitely not an actual guarantee. I CAN guarantee that you will not be interrupted by anyone asking you for snacks, though, as there are no children allowed in this hotel.)
Anna Barrett — I’ve personally gone to Anna, she’s a former Madeline Milburn agent and she’s excellent
Catherine Gough — I’ve gone to Catherine too and she’s great. She used to work as the commissioning editor at HarperCollins Ireland and her fingerprints are all over so many Irish bestsellers
Kristen Weber - comes highly recommended by Elaine R. Frieman
Heather Sangster - recommended by a lovely subscriber who really enjoyed working with her (oh and Heather Sangster has been Margaret Atwood’s copy editor for years!!)
Vera Kurian — I have just ordered Vera’s debut NEVER SAW ME COMING (which by coincidence was published by Park Row, the same imprint that published my debut)
C.J. Cooke — the way she writes about gothic storytelling is insanely brilliant
Lindy West — her recent vlogs of her book tour are so full of personality and humour, I’m addicted to them!
Writing on the Side CC Holland’s cover, you guys:
Hope you found this helpful! Better go as I have to get 2,500 words of my WIP done in the next 24 hours - surely the prosecco will help, right??
Keep writing!
Caroline x
P.S. This Instagram reel about men writing women badly is cracking me up
If you enjoyed this post, you might also enjoy my Bad Sisters X Fleabag debut novel, THE MARRIAGE VENDETTA. Paperback is out now 👇
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