Viking Books – Awards

Penguin Viking

Overview

Viking Penguin is comprised of Viking Books, Penguin Books, Penguin Classics, Pamela Dorman Books, Penguin Life, and The Open Field.  

Viking Books, one of the most respected imprints in trade publishing, specializes in bringing extraordinary books to the broadest possible readership. We build on a hundred-year history to publish books for the 21st century, with a focus on innovation and creativity from acquisition through publication. Our expertise is making bestsellers and award winners out of literary and book club fiction, suspense fiction, and nonfiction from academics, journalists, thought leaders, and inspiring guides to the ideas that change our culture.

Penguin Books is the industry leader in paperback publishing across the board: in its curation of its backlist catalog of almost 2,500 active titles; as the home of Viking’s paperback reprints; and as the publisher of a select list of paperback originals. Some of the authors whose legacies Penguin maintains include Saul Bellow, J.M. Coetzee, Jack Kerouac, Ken Kesey, Iris Murdoch, and Amy Tan. 

Penguin is also a notable publisher of poetry, with a list headlined by Terrance Hayes, Paul Tran, and Phillip Williams.

Viking Penguin editors also acquire for Penguin Life. Penguin Classics and Penguin Life editors also acquire for Viking Penguin.

Meet the Team

Brian Tart, President and Publisher

Brian Tart was named president and publisher of Viking in January 2015, and Penguin Books in 2020. He started his career as an editorial assistant at Bantam Books before moving to Dutton in 1998 and eventually becoming the president and publisher of Dutton for nine years. Brian continues to edit both fiction and nonfiction, working with Ken Follett, John le Carré, Elizabeth George, Craig Johnson, Andrew Roberts, and Timothy Keller, among others.

Andrea Schulz, Vice President and Editor in Chief

Andrea Schulz joined Viking as editor in chief in January 2015. She oversees the list of Viking hardcovers and Penguin trade paperback originals, and acquires literary fiction, mysteries, and narrative nonfiction. Among the bestselling authors she edits are the novelist Tana French and the writer and artist Chanel Miller, whose memoir Know My Name was a New York Times Notable Book, winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award for autobiography, and winner of the Dayton Literary Peace Prize. She also edits Susannah Cahalan, Tracy Chevalier, Timothy Egan, Robert Greene, Danielle Henderson, A. M. Homes, and Wayétu Moore, among others. She began her career as a bookseller.

Patrick Nolan, Vice President and Publisher, Penguin Books

Patrick Nolan joined the company in 2000 as sales director and is now the book-publishing right hand to Viking, overseeing their paperback reprints and a select list of Penguin trade paperback originals as well as the backlist. As an editor he is interested in a wide variety of literary and commercial nonfiction and fiction. He has published numerous titles by Matt Haig, including The Midnight Library and The Comfort Book; Here We Are by Benjamin Taylor; Twilight Man by Liz Brown; The Night Singer by Johanna Mo; Coming Out to Play by Robbie Rogers; Surfacing by Kathleen Jamie; as well as forthcoming publications from Keyu Jin, Rio Cortez, Farah Karim-Cooper, and Richard Deming.

Kate Stark, Senior Vice President, Associate Publisher

Kate Stark is Senior Vice President, Associate Publisher for Viking and Penguin, Penguin Classics and their imprints. She joined Viking in January of 2015, overseeing the marketing and publicity departments. Prior to joining Viking Kate had been the Marketing Director for Putnam Books. Kate was also  Associate Publisher and Director of Marketing for Riverhead Books. She has overseen the campaigns of many bestselling authors including Amor Towles, Sue Monk Kidd,  Ruth Ozeki, Rebecca Makkai, Jojo Moyes, Adam Grant, Elaine Welteroth, Maria Shriver, as well as Khaled Hosseini, Paula Hawkins, Brit Bennet, Lauren Groff, Dan Pink, Meg Wolitzer, and Emma Straub.

Ibrahim Ahmad, Executive Editor

Ibrahim Ahmad joined Viking as executive editor in 2021. His nonfiction interests include current affairs, politics, history, science and technology, biography, business, and pop culture. He also publishes an eclectic array of literary fiction and crime fiction, with a particular focus on incendiary, urgent voices that subvert and expand the existing literature. His first title on the Viking list, His Name Is George Floyd by Robert Samuels and Toluse Olorunnipa, won the 2023 Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction and was a finalist for the National Book Award; other recent and forthcoming titles include works by Nathaniel Philbrick, Ruth Ozeki, Heather Cox Richardson, Nancy Isenberg, Nancy MacLean, Salman Khan, Matthew F. Delmont, Fab 5 Freddy, and Dwyer Murphy. As editorial director at Akashic Books, where he worked for two decades, Ahmad published a list of extraordinary writers from around the world, including Maaza Mengiste, Chris Abani, Tayari Jones, Marlon James, Amiri Baraka, Kwame Dawes, Bernardine Evaristo, Nelson George, Percival Everett, Dennis Lehane, George Pelecanos, Ben Okri, Edwidge Danticat, Michael Stipe, Prodigy from Mobb Deep, Michael Imperioli, and Adam Mansbach.

Allison Lorentzen, Executive Editor

Allison Lorentzen joined Viking in 2012. She edits idea-driven narrative nonfiction, with a focus on social issues, popular culture, and reportage. She also edits literary fiction and the occasional mystery, and is often drawn to novels with memorable voices, a sense of humor, and settings that span the globe. She has worked with writers Erica C. Barnett, Uché Blackstock, MD, Zinzi Clemmons, Leopoldine Core, Caleb Crain, Jasper Fforde, Naomi Fry, Keith Gessen, Felix Gillette and John Koblin, Lev Grossman, Hanna Halperin, Seth Harp, Rajia Hassib, Jean Chen Ho, Jolie Kerr, Elizabeth Little, Karan Mahajan, Haley Mlotek, Andrew Ridker, Rebecca Scherm, Ben Shattuck, Mihret Sibhat, Stephen Witt, and Matthew Wolfe. Prior to joining Viking, Lorentzen was an editor at Penguin Books and HarperCollins. A graduate of Wesleyan University, she is a founding editor of n+1.

Laura Tisdel, Executive Editor

Laura Tisdel (she/her) began her career as a publicist at Viking and returned as an executive editor in 2015 after five years at Little, Brown. She acquires voice-driven fiction and nonfiction in categories ranging from domestic suspense, literary, and genre-bending novels to prescriptive nonfiction and memoir. She devours books with a strong sense of place, that tackle thorny issues through a personal lens, and address science, medical history, and personal growth through storytelling. She publishes bestselling, prize-winning, and acclaimed works by authors including NoViolet Bulawayo, Abigail Dean, Jamil Jan Kochai, Jen Sincero, Uzo Aduba, David Allen, Kristina Kuzmic, Andrew Ross Sorkin, Cassandra Jackson, Ada Calhoun, Idra Novey, and Gothataone Moeng. 

Lindsey Schwoeri, Senior Editor

Lindsey Schwoeri joined Viking Penguin in 2013 after six years at Random House. She publishes literary and upmarket commercial fiction (most commonly with a suspense or mystery element), narrative nonfiction, and memoir. In nonfiction, she is particularly drawn to books that illuminate political or social issues through individual stories; other interests include arts, culture, and entertainment; animals and nature; feminism, women’s health, and motherhood. She has edited multiple New York Times bestsellers, a Reese’s Book Club pick, and an Edgar Award winner, and the authors she’s published have been finalists for the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Award, the Booker Prize, and the Women’s Prize, among others. They include the novelists Mona Awad, Flynn Berry, Halle Butler, Rebecca Makkai, Sarah Thankam Mathews, Sunjeev Sahota, Phillip B. Williams, and Alejandro Zambra; journalists Bianca Bosker, Melissa Segura, and Yuan Yang; Uber whistleblower Susan Fowler; and U.S. Senator Mazie K. Hirono.

Emily Wunderlich, Senior Editor

Emily Wunderlich joined Viking in 2015. She acquires nonfiction in a range of categories, including narrative nonfiction, history and journalism, big idea, inspiration and business, popular science and literary nonfiction. She is particularly drawn to strong voices, fresh takes, and new arguments that recast our understanding of the world around us or even help us live better, and seeks to publish a multitude of underrepresented voices, perspectives, and experiences. She has been proud to publish bestselling, award-winning, and critically acclaimed books by Sonia Purnell, Sahaj Kaur Kohli, Jason De León, Mattie Kahn, Paco de Leon, Camilla Pang, Richard Overy, Erika Sánchez, Charlotte Alter, and Cal Flyn. She ran a nonfiction literary reading series in Manhattan called Big Umbrella, and prior to Viking, she worked at Gotham Books and Macmillan. She is a graduate of the University of Missouri and began her publishing career at The Missouri Review.

Terezia Cicel, Senior Editor

Terezia Cicel joined Viking in 2018, after several years at Knopf and Blue Rider Press. She edits serious and narrative nonfiction in a wide range of topics, including history, science, big idea, current affairs, true crime, pop culture, and more. Her list includes best-selling and award-winning books by authors such as Vaclav Smil, Dan Jones, Valerie Fridland, Sean Patrick Cooper, Antony Beevor, Susan Jonusas, and Jonathan Kaufman, as well as forthcoming titles by Daisy Dunn, Rollo Romig, Caitlin Rivers, Samar Ali, Erica Chenoweth, Christopher Summerfield, and Vincent Schilling. She hails from Slovakia by way of Massachusetts and is a graduate of New York University.

Nidhi Pugalia, Editor

Nidhi Pugalia joined Viking Penguin in 2019, after beginning her editorial career at Grand Central Publishing. In fiction, she is drawn to lyrical writing and propulsive plotting in the speculative, grounded science fiction/fantasy, and magical realism spaces with a particular emphasis on books that can cross with other categories like romance, historical fiction, psychological suspense, and thriller. She’s also looking for romantic novels that range from the bittersweet to the giddy, exploring love in all its varied facets. She is interested in select narrative nonfiction and philosophical self-help from smart, passionate writers who offer a fresh or niche perspective. In all areas she’s especially looking to fill her list with books that celebrate LGBTQ+ voices and BIPOC cultures and perspectives. She is the editor of such books as the Book of the Month club pick A Thousand Times Before by Asha Thanki, New York Times Book Review Editor’s Choice The Djinn Waits a Hundred Years by Shubnum Khan, and the Sunday Times bestselling series Her Majesty’s Royal Coven by Juno Dawson. Among the authors she has worked with are Sally Wen Mao, Sahaj Kaur Kohli, Tana French, Chanel Miller, Megan Barnard, Tracy Chevalier, Timothy Egan, Brenda Peynado, Gwen Kirby, and Erin Swan, among others.

Allie Merola, Editor

Allie Merola acquires fiction, nonfiction, and poetry for Viking Penguin and Penguin Poets. She is interested in literary and upmarket fiction with a distinctive voice and pitch; mystery and suspense novels with complex, unusual characters and a strong sense of place; narrative, idea-driven, and multidisciplinary nonfiction and essays across a wide range of subjects—including youth culture and subcultures, social science, psychology, philosophy, and the internet—that is anchored by a fresh, clear, and memorable point of view; and poetry that is intimate, conceptually ambitious, and disarming. Across genres, she is drawn to writing with a sense of humor and projects that interrogate our political, social, and moral convictions. Since joining Viking Penguin in 2018, she has worked with authors including Zahra Hankir, Rebecca Makkai, Phillip B. Williams, Rita Bullwinkel, Bianca Bosker, Flynn Berry, Terrance Hayes, Sarah Thankam Mathews, Alice Notley, Rebecca Solnit, Rio Cortez, Sunjeev Sahota, and Alejandro Zambra.

Camille LeBlanc, Associate Editor

Camille LeBlanc works with Allison Lorentzen. She is drawn to fiction and nonfiction that explore timeless questions in contemporary contexts; character-driven stories that illuminate geopolitical tensions; and books that are funny, perspective-altering, and have an element of suspense. She joined Viking Penguin in 2020 after working as an editorial fellow at Lit Hub and as an assistant to a bestselling crime writer.

Jenn Houghton, Publishing Associate

Jenn Houghton (she/her) joined Viking Penguin in October 2021 and assists Brian Tart. She graduated with a Creative Writing B.A. from William Paterson University, which she earned while managing a retail business in Montclair, New Jersey. Moving on from small business, she entered the world of publishing with a passion for absurdist fiction, introspective narratives, and multicultural perspectives.

Elizabeth Pham Janowski, Editorial Assistant

Elizabeth Pham Janowski (she/her) joined Viking in March 2023. She is the assistant to Andrea Schulz and Ibrahim Ahmad. Originally from Milwaukee, Wisconsin, she graduated from Dartmouth College with a degree in history and film studies and received her master’s in journalism from Columbia University. Her passions include bold, narrative-driven histories and cultural criticism, as well as fiction that spotlights queer voices and underrepresented cultures. 

Emma Dollar, Editorial Assistant

Emma Dollar joined Viking in October 2023 as the assistant to Patrick Nolan and John Siciliano. She graduated from Emory University with a degree in English & Creative Writing and International Studies, where her concentration on Latin American literature made her fall in love with works in translation. She is drawn to unusual stories and experimental literature that explore questions of identity, family, and the environment, with a particular interest in magical realism and works that challenge societal norms.

Sonia Gadre, Editorial Assistant

Sonia Gadre joined Viking in February 2024 as the assistant to Lindsey Schwoeri and Allie Merola. She graduated from Yale University with a B.A. in English and computer science. Prior to joining Viking Penguin, Sonia was an editorial assistant at The Yale Review and a product manager at Twitter. Her interests include literary fiction, narrative nonfiction, and inventive poetry. She grew up in Louisville, Kentucky and enjoys reading about the rural United States and the Global South.

Maya Petrillo-Fernandez, Editorial Assistant

Maya Petrillo-Fernandez joined Viking and Pamela Dorman Books in March 2024, assisting Terezia Cicel and Seema Mahanian. Previously, Maya taught high school English in her hometown of NYC before pivoting to publishing as an assistant at Folio Literary Management. She enjoys character-driven fiction, narrative nonfiction, and literature across genres that sheds light on lesser-known histories.

Carlos Zayas-Pons, Editorial Assistant

Carlos Zayas-Pons joined Viking in April 2024, assisting Laura Tisdel and Emily Wunderlich. Growing up in Georgia, he graduated from Sewanee: The University of the South in 2020 with a B.A. in English and Spanish. After graduation, he worked at the Paris Review, the Sewanee School of Letters MFA, and most recently the Sewanee Review. Carlos’s interest gravitates toward literary fiction, theory, and criticism, but he is also passionate about film, poetry, and visual art—especially in the Spanish-speaking world.