Daisy Chandley is an Agent in the Books Department, and also works with Tim Bates as the UK sub-agent for New Directions Publishing in the US. She joined Peters, Fraser & Dunlop in 2019 after graduating from the University of Oxford with a BA in Politics, Philosophy and Economics.
What I’m looking for…
I represent a wide range of authors, including prize-winners and Sunday Times and USA Today bestsellers, and am actively building a list of both fiction and non-fiction across a variety of genres.
With fiction, my wishlist roughly falls into three categories, though I absolutely welcome things that overlap between them.
1) Sharp, original novels on the literary to upmarket spectrum, all the way from dark and boundary-pushing books like Hurricane Season, Under The Skin or In The Cut to those balancing edge, heart and humour, like Detransition, Baby, The Idiot, The Wedding People, or Greta and Valdin. I love irreverent wit, incisive observation, boldness in story or form, and unsettling undertones (or overtones) in equal measure, and would love to find books that – in the tradition of authors like Toni Morrison and Lorrie Moore – draw characters and depict life in a way that is deeply and sincerely emotional without losing that touch of humour and brutality that keep it from sentimentality. On the other hand, I’m also very keen to see things which follow that darker train all the way to fully fledged horror, especially horror that feels distinctly contemporary (i.e more We’re All Going To The World’s Fair than Nosferatu). Some recent (to me) favourites across the board have been Sheila Heti’s Motherhood, Solvej Balle’s On The Calculation of Volume, Alan Warner’s Morvern Callar, and Laurie Colwin’s Another Marvelous Thing.
2) Romance, particularly romance with humour to it. This of course includes romcoms (whether a fresh take on a tropey contemporary romcom or the more unusual, genre-bending style of something like Palm Springs), but a contemporary romance, paranormal romance, horrrormance, dystomance or grounded romantasy with some dry wit and/or flirting-via-bullying absolutely fits the bill too. At at the moment I’d love to find contemporary dark academia, a high-concept dystopia, enemies to lovers where they’re actually enemies, anything that has the energy of the golden age of the CW (i.e has a The Vampire Diaries, Pretty Little Liars or Gossip Girl edge), and/or anything that feels really decadent and sexy without being too heavy on the fantasy worldbuilding.
3) Mysteries – I’m not the right person for police procedurals or commercial thrillers, but I’m always very keen to see a well-crafted mystery. Whether it’s a smart and tightly crafted detective story like Knives Out or The Devotion of Suspect X, or a dark and page-turning literary mystery like Kala or The God of the Woods, I love anything that plays with our assumptions, especially if it uses some clever tricks with perspective or form to do so.
I’m definitely interested in literary speculative fiction, though I’m not generally looking for hard SFF, and don’t represent children’s authors, However, I’m very happy to look at romantasy that the author considers to be YA as long as the protagonists are over 18.
On the non-fiction side, I’m looking for insightful new voices and captivating stories in science and nature, art and culture, social issues and politics, and love and relationships. I love to read across the whole spectrum in these areas, from an expert making a groundbreaking new theory accessible and relevant, to more personal, narrative writing that blurs and pushes boundaries with topic and approach. Some recent favourites have been Chiara Barzini’s Aqua, Lamorna Ash’s Don’t Forget We’re Here Forever, Jason Okundaye’s Revolutionary Acts and Emily LaBarge’s Dog Days. I don’t work on much straight practical self-help, personal development, or pure memoir, but am definitely interested to see things that sit across those lines, such as narrative non-fiction integrating elements of memoir, or a more literary or scientific approach to a way we can live better.
I’d also love to find illustrated non-fiction on the less narrative side – anything from upmarket, playful gift books to fresh and covetable approaches to food and drink writing, especially if you have an existing platform in any space that you want to draw on.
