Agent Interview: Lee Melillo, Associate Agent at Dunham Literary
Today we’re interviewing Lee Melillo, Dunham Literary’s new Associate Agent. Lee joined us in May 2024 as Jennie Dunham’s assistant, where she spent the last year learning the tools of the trade. Now, Lee hopes to build a list featuring YA and Adult fiction.
Check out her MSWL for more specific info on what she’s looking for.
Have you always been a reader?
Always. From a very young age, my mom regularly brought me to the Atwater Library in my hometown of North Branford, Connecticut, where I spent many a day pestering our wonderful librarian, Donna Wiedenmann. I remember leaving each visit with no less than ten picture books tucked away in my mom’s bag, which grew increasingly heavy as I graduated to chapter books and proper middle grade novels. Some of my early obsessions were the series Rainbow Magic, The Time Warp Trio, Avalon: Web of Magic, Diary of a Wimpy Kid, A Series of Unfortunate Events, and Warriors. When I turned eleven, Donna kindly let me volunteer at the library, which I did for nearly three years, and could not have enjoyed more – in many ways, I feel like I truly became a “person” while working there. I could go on about it forever, but all to say: books are, and always have been, the core of my life (also, I love libraries).
What led you to agenting?
Me, fresh out of college, working my first post-grad job as a docent at the Museum of Broadway!
I’d learned about agenting as a possible career earlier than you might expect. One of the librarians at the Atwater had an author in the family who had recently gotten agented. Naturally, my precocious eleven-year-old self spent the rest of the shift googling what that meant. I was giddy by the end of it – I couldn’t believe it was an actual job that existed!
That said, I wasn’t always sure I’d end up here. In undergrad at Fordham, I majored in both Theatre Directing and English. As I took classes and did internships in both fields, I fell in love with each community equally. Most importantly, it taught me that I loved supporting writers, whether authors or playwrights. By graduation, all I knew was that I wanted to make a career in walking alongside other creatives as they bring their art into the world.
After graduating, I worked a hodgepodge of day jobs: museum docent, Times Square restaurant hostess, production assistant, paralegal, and more. I was also pursuing my theatrical interests in my limited free time. I enjoyed this lifestyle well enough, but I yearned for the literary community that I’d grown up in. Around the same time, I was leaving my previous job and randomly happened upon the assistant role here at Dunham Lit. Jennie took a chance on me and, through her and Anjanette’s unwavering support and mentorship, I’ve become certain publishing is where I want to be.
What are your biggest goals as an agent?
As a neurodivergent child who often felt like an actor without a script, reading is how I “learned” the world. And now, in adulthood, I count on books to act as windows into worlds and experiences I’d never have otherwise. Literature is one of our most effective tools for developing empathy and banishing ignorance, and, as an agent, I want to forge relationships with authors who believe that as well. Agents are the industry’s first “gatekeepers” to traditional publishing, and I want to ensure that I’m doing all I can to hold that gate open for as many wonderful writers as I can – particularly writers from historically underrepresented communities who deserve to have their voices amplified and their stories told.
Also, as I’m coming from a theatre background, collaboration is the heartwood of my creative practice. I don’t just want to be an agent, I want to be a reliable shoulder, a loyal friend, and a fierce ally for my authors and the projects they hold dear. I want to help unite my authors with editors who share their values and their passion for their work, and ensure that everyone involved feels supported, heard, and valued every step of the way.
What gets you excited about a new book?
Me definitely reading for real in a not-at-all staged, candid image.
First and foremost, craft. I can usually tell within the first few pages of a manuscript if I gel with the writing style. Unfortunately, I don’t have a checklist for good writing I can articulate here – as frustratingly nebulous as it may be, I just know it when I see it, and what clicks for me may well be different for another reader. That said, having a strong sense of voice and dialogue is always vital. Witty, snappy, realistic dialogue and a distinct narrative voice are incredibly important to me. I need characters who talk like real people, and narrators whose personalities are 3-D from the first page. I always say, if the voice and characters can draw me in immediately, I’m willing to listen to just about any story they’d like to tell.
Beyond that, there’s not a lot of specifics. I love a high-concept hook, but read widely, so what that looks like changes regularly. In general, though, I’m always looking for something truly unique. Books are windows into other worlds, like I said above, and if I can open the same window in my proverbial living room, it’ll be harder to keep my attention.
What are some books that changed your life?
This could quite easily become an endless list, so I’ll limit it to five:
Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi: I read this as a senior in high school and promptly cried for three days. I was a mess. It is one of the most well-written, meticulously researched, emotional novels I’ve ever had the pleasure of reading, and I would argue it jumpstarted my interest in historical fiction which remains strong to this day. This was also one of the last books I read before my college interviews, and I probably brought it up in every single one.
Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut: Also a beloved high school read, and while I’m quite certain there’s nothing I can say that hasn’t already been said by others, the impact this book had on my worldview and how I perceive time and the nature of suffering cannot be overstated. The phrase “so it goes” has helped me through many hard moments and I’ve fallen back on its lessons time and again.
Turtles All the Way Down by John Green: I’ve had severe OCD since I was young, and while this book was at times devastating, the dominant emotion I felt while reading was relief. Relief that someone finally managed to put into words the utterly debilitating experience of this illness. Whenever I have a friend or relative curious about my struggles, I lend them my copy of this – to this day, it’s the only book I’ve read that manages to capture the exact nature of an OCD thought spiral and my gratitude to John Green for writing it is eternal.
Human Acts by Han Kang: One of the first Korean novels I ever read, which led me to develop what’s become a long-term interest in Korean literature. Another historical novel, it focuses on the 1980 Gwangju Uprising. It takes an event I hadn’t heard of before and managed to capture the impact of it on not only individual and community levels, but a societal one as well. That duality is something I look for in all books I read now, especially in more literary spaces: how something can simultaneously be so impactful on both a micro and macro scale.
Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Fairies by Heather Fawcett: My most recent read on this list, this reminded me why I love reading in the first place. I’m a lifelong fairy lover, and Emily Wilde is one of the few protagonists I’ve read as an adult I have truly seen myself represented in, and beyond that, nearly every element – the comedy, the framing device, the soft romance, the annotations, the found family, the fairies!!! – was pitch-perfect for me. Reading it right as I entered agenting was a real north star moment for me and what projects I want to pursue.
And here I’ll force myself to stop. But to quickly list some other authors who’ve had immeasurable impact on me in various seasons of my life: Leigh Bardugo, Octavia Butler, Suzanne Collins, Toni Morrison, R. F. Kuang, Leo Tolstoy, Scott Westerfeld, Kazuo Ishiguro, Wendy Mass, and all the Erins Hunter.
Are there any books that don’t exist yet you’d like to see?
I’m so glad you asked. I have a few conceptual white whales I would love, love, love to see in our query inbox one day and am manifesting daily. Broadly, I’d like: 1) a reverse-Hallmark movie plot where a rural farmboy falls for a city girl and leaves his small town behind to become a banker (or something similar); 2) a K-pop idol sasaeng thriller; 3) a workplace dramedy set in a 2010s Buzzfeed-style content creation company; 4) a high-stakes (possibly supernatural?) horror/thriller against the backdrop of a YouTube convention like VidCon; 5) a high-concept rom-com where the FMC is autistic and seen as desirable/not infantalized; and, finally, 6) a lovers-to-friends narrative – give me a reverse When Harry Met Sally, a platonic love story between exes or an ex-situationship that somehow make friendship work.
Why do I want these things? I just think they’d be neat. I would also like to say I am very interested in representing books by Pacific Islander authors. While there are many, many representation gaps in this industry, this is one of the most glaring ones, and I am very committed to doing what I can to support Pacific Islanders interested in publishing.
Outside of publishing, what are your interests?
Some dear theatre friends and I after the premiere reading of a new play we worked on together (that I wrote!) at an off-Broadway theatre.
Theatre (and specifically playwriting) takes up the biggest chunk of my non-work hours. I have an indie theatre company, Personal Pizza Party, which I run with a few college friends. We founded it as a way to keep ourselves in creative community with each other as we pursue our careers, and it’s been an utterly rewarding experience – I’ve met so many of my closest friends through it and other assorted indie theatre gigs I’ve done over the last few years!
Otherwise, I’m almost always consuming some sort of art. I’m nearly as much of a film and TV fanatic as I am a literature and theatre lover, and I have crazy extensive Spotify playlists I’m always running on a loop. My other hobbies include baking, vintage shopping, editing Wikipedia pages, gaming, and wandering aimlessly throughout my beloved neighborhood, Sunnyside Gardens.
I also love hanging out with my two perfect cats, Meatloaf and Muffin Man.
Anything else you’d like to add?
Just my most profound and utterly overwhelming thanks to Jennie and Anjanette for welcoming me so warmly into the Dunham Lit family, and shepherding me through my first year here. I’ll never be able to overstate the amount of patience, care, and mentorship I’ve received from both of them, and I could not be happier to be continuing my publishing journey alongside them both in this exciting new role. <3
