Want an agency that feels homey? Random House veteran Larry Weissman operates his company from his Brooklyn apartment, where a comfy place to orchestrate six-figure book deals. "Weissman favors literary narrative nonfiction, and he has carved out a niche representing young journalists with bold voices," says Jill Singer. "In nonfiction, he also loves working with people who are experts at the top of their field-like, say Ray Takeyh of the Council on Foreign Relations. These clients tend to be more academically minded, having come out of thinktanks or having published previously with university presses. Weissman says he tends toward this type of writer-the journalist, the academic-because these are often the people who are constantly parsing what life is like right now. "I'm interested in books that hold up a mirror to human condition at the beginning of the 21st century," Weissman says. Other nonfiction picks: politics, pop sociological studies, pop culture, and anything to do with food-he'd even consider doing a cookbook." Fiction has to feel "vital." "No genre fiction, no children's, no poetry. Short stories are accepted, but only if the author can sell Weissman on an idea for a novel as well." Send your pitches email with a page-long pitch.