Thank you for your interest in our Literary Agency.
Here at CWLA, our staff and contributors have a shared goal to create engaging Picture & Early Chapter books for young readers.
Early Chapter Books: I have genuine empathy with parents of children that are reluctant readers; as a mum of two boys myself, it can be incredibly hard to engage some children with reading. I believe there is a real need in the industry to create stimulating children’s content as a key stepping-stone into independent reading with Early Chapter books. This reading age group are very loyal to a ‘good’ series, which is often overlooked by writers and illustrators who either target at a higher age level with more detailed chapter books or a much younger age group with picture books. Our aim here is to bring a wider selection into the market by ensuring the storylines are engaging, relevant and by offering different formats, easier reading text and just by creating great stories!
Picture Books:As co-founder of one of the leading illustration agencies, I have over 20 years of experience in Children’s Publishing. I understand how important it is to match artwork and text to present an obvious choice to publishers. The enormous goodwill I have built up with 100’s of illustrators, and my reputation for having a high conversion rate, means that we can often produce speculative samples for publishers the same day. Clients benefit from how that translates into a smooth commissioning process.
I also understand the author’s side of the business. As a writer, I appreciate the fine balance of creative input with the pressure of deadlines. I really enjoy working with our like-minded authors who share the same passion for bringing immersive and imaginative content to market through young literature.
I look forward to hearing from you and hopefully working with you in the near future.
Caroline Wakeman
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Kate Johnson
Senior Sales Agent
With over 20 years of experience and insights in children’s publishing, Kate Johnson is CWLA’s senior sales agent. She is an expert storyteller with ideas, imagination, and interaction as her superpowers. As our senior sales agent, Kate uses her expertise and insights to help our authors create bestsellers, such as Phil Heckles’s Rubbish Pet Portraits and Who’s a Clever Boy Then?.
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Elizabeth Chase
Senior Editor
Introducing Elizabeth (Lil) Chase as our newest Senior Editor! Lil has 15 years experience of editing and creating stories for some of the biggest selling children’s books around the world. She’s an author in her own right, having written 13 novels to date, many of which have sold internationally. She’s never happier than when polishing a manuscript to perfection.
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Chris Herriott
Sales Agent
Based in sunny Brighton, Chris is our UK Sales Agent here at Caroline Wakeman Literary Agency. He trained as an actor which led him to working in Film and TV production on TV commercials and high end content. Chris's prior experience in the TV and Film industry covered TV distribution and selling programmes to Channels around the world. Chris has also worked with our sister agencies Advocate Art and Collaborate on children's content in varying markets, with a focus on children's publishing. Chris has a passion for film and animation and is your contact for TV and Film format sales too! Connect with Chris to learn more about CWLA’s authors and available rights!
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Cassy Smith
Editorial and Marketing Assistant
As our editorial and marketing assistant, Cassy brings with her, a passion for books and experience with editing, social media, and graphic design. She has a B.S. in marketing communications from Emerson College and an M.F.A. in media design from Full Sail University. Cassy focuses on helping Caroline and our authors with all marketing efforts, including social media, newsletters, blogs, and press. She also assists the sales team in creating sales files and proofreading manuscripts.
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Lucy Hairsine
Assistant to CEO and Sales Team
Lucy has extensive experience in the literary world, working 11+ years for the literary agency representing J.K. Rowling. Her first role was project managing The Wizarding World of Harry Potter theme park at the Christopher Little Literary Agency on behalf of J.K. Rowling. She then moved to The Blair Partnership becoming a Partner of the agency, as Head of Brand Management and then a Creative Director role. Lucy worked across a broad range of projects including publishing, TV and film, themed entertainment, consumer products, interactive entertainment, theatre, digital and more.
In 2017, Lucy's work on TV projects and film scripts led her to work on a freelance basis for the BBC in Franchise and TV Development.
Lucy is now thrilled to be part of the CWLA team. She spends most of her free time reading, at the cinema or watching gritty TV shows, and when not chasing her kids, she loves to travel.
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Jasmin Sadhwani
Finance Department
Jasmin Sadhwani is our Financial Controller here at CWLA. She started helping the team with royalties a few years ago, and her passion for number crunching has allowed her to grow into our Financial Controller. Jasmine is a pleasure to work with, as she has a calm nature and is always there to help. Outside of work, Jasmin loves to cook, bake, and spend time with her young son.