Agents & Editors (2025)

Pennwriters offers many ways for our attendees to meet and get feedback from agents and editors in the publishing industry.

• Pitch Sessions: One-on-one agent/editor appointments are available at no additional fee. You must have a finished manuscript to sign up for a pitch session. Spots are limited and are filled on a first-registered, first-assigned basis. Sign up for 8-minute pitch sessions when you register for the conference. Please note: A pitch session does not guarantee publication.
• Agents/editors will also be leading workshop sessions and participating in panel discussions. Bring your questions about the publishing process and hear these experts talk about the state of the industry.
• Agents and editors are also part of our Friday night read-and-critique sessions, where you can get feedback on your writing from industry pros.

Melanie Billings
Wild Rose Press

Melanie joined the editing team of the Wild Rose Press at the end of 2014. While she has worked as an editor on every line, her favorite genres are: Fantasy, Sci-fi, YA, Mystery/Thriller, and Historical Romance.

Since 1998, Melanie has worked in various aspects of Ebook publishing. She graduated with a Bachelor’s Degree from Roberts Wesleyan College in 1997 having majored in both English Literature and Communication. In addition to editing, she loves to write and enjoys participating in various writing challenges throughout the year.

You can find Melanie on Facebook and X.

What Melanie is seeking:  All Romance Genres, Science Fiction, Fantasy, YA, Historical, All Mystery Genres, LBGTQ+ Fiction

PLEASE NO: Erotica/Erotic Romance, Poetry, Memoirs, Non-Fiction.

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Shawn Reilly Simmons, President and Managing Editor
Level Best Books

Shawn Reilly Simmons is President and Managing Editor at Level Best Books, a crime fiction press with a roster of roughly two hundred authors. A published author herself, Shawn is most passionate about bringing new voices to the forefront, collaborating with authors on their work, and promoting the books published by Level Best to the widest possible audience.

What Shawn is seeking:  Mystery (series or standalone), Thriller, Domestic Suspense, Traditional/Cozy series, young adult fiction (mystery, coming of age), middle-grade fiction (mystery, magical realism), True Crime, culinary-focused (cookbooks, cooking memoir, mystery related culinary books).

Level Best Books
Shawn Reilly Simmons

Noah Ballard
Verve

Noah Ballard is a literary and media rights agent at Verve, a full-service Hollywood talent agency with offices in New York and Los Angeles. He currently leads Verve’s Intellectual Property team, which includes book publishing, journalism and magazine publishing, digital, podcasting and media/adaptation rights. Noah has been representing bestselling authors of fiction and non-fiction for over a decade, previously at Emma Sweeney Agency and Curtis Brown Ltd. He studied creative writing at the University of Nebraska and has appeared at graduate writing programs and writers conferences across the country speaking about query letters, building non-fiction platforms, optioning film/TV rights and creating compelling narratives. Noah is an honoree of Publisher’s Weekly Star Watch Award. A New Jersey native, he currently lives in Brooklyn, NY.

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Rebecca Shaevitz
Verve

Rebecca Shaevitz is a literary agent at Verve Talent & Literary Agency, a full-service Entertainment and Publishing agency with offices in New York and Los Angeles. On the nonfiction side, Rebecca specializes in narrative and platform-driven works, and on the fiction side she’s focused on YA and thrillers, among other categories. Rebecca has worked with authors like Ben McKenzie, Jen Hamilton, Hadley Vlahos, Tochi Onyebuchi, Anna Akbari, and Cinelle Barnes. A graduate of Washington University in St. Louis, Rebecca began her career in the Entertainment world at Seth MacFarlane’s Fuzzy Door Entertainment, and is especially passionate about supporting authors’ ambitions across other media verticals such as film/TV and audio, in addition to publishing.

What Rebecca is seeking: 

• Incisive, compelling narrative nonfiction, platform driven nonfiction, and memoir
• In Fiction:
  • High concept thrillers
  • Dark Academia
  • Romantic Comedy with depth
  • YA with themes of self-discovery, sexuality, identity, etc.

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Wendy McClure

Wendy McClure is a writer and a children’s book editor. She is the author of The Wilder Life: My Adventures in the Lost World of Little House on the Prairie, which won the Midwest Booksellers Choice Award for nonfiction in 2011, received a starred review from Publishers Weekly, and was a Barnes & Noble Discover Pick. Her 2005 memoir, I’m Not the New Me, was featured in publications such as Time Magazine, USA Today, Elle, and the San Francisco Chronicle. Her infamous online collection of vintage Weight Watcher recipe cards and commentary was published in the 2006 humor book The Amazing Mackerel Pudding Plan. For more than a decade she wrote the PopTart pop culture column for BUST Magazine, and her work has appeared in publications such as The New York Times Magazine, Glamour, The Chicago Sun-Times, and on the radio program This American Life. She has an MFA in poetry from the Iowa Writer’s Workshop.

Her work in children’s books includes two picture books, the historical fiction series Wanderville, and the numerous picture books and young adult novels she’s edited over the years.