Christina Miller is a romance-and-horror specialist at Nancy Yost Literary Agency who hunts for paranormal adventure, Gothic chills, and female-driven mythology retellings in adult fiction — with a particular weakness for stories that blur the line between romance and dread.
In brief
Her wishlist is tightly adult-fiction only — no MG, no picture books, no nonfiction, no sci-fi/fantasy, and explicitly no romantasy or body horror, so genre-straddlers must read those gates carefully before querying.
Romance is her clear center of gravity: she spans contemporary, paranormal, romantic adventure, suspense, and category romance, with a stated appetite for competitive-reality-TV settings and cowboy romance written from the female gaze.
Her horror interest is specifically Gothic and paranormal/supernatural — ghost stories, haunted houses, creepy cults — not gore or extreme body horror; horrormance (horror-romance hybrids) sits at the top of her wish list.
Her background as a Foreign Rights Assistant at a major literary management firm suggests she thinks about a book's international commercial life, a useful angle for writers with cross-market appeal.
Her academic focus on medieval literature and Classic & Medieval Studies translates into a genuine editorial instinct for folklore and mythology retellings, especially in ancient-through-early-modern female-driven narratives — this is not a casual interest.
Lately
Her current agency profile makes clear she's especially eager for horrormance with Crimson Peak energy, paranormal investigator romances, competitive reality TV romance, cowboy romance written for the female gaze, and romantic adventure with classic cinematic adventure-film vibes.
What Christina is looking for
Her single most-flagged priority. She wants genre hybrids that marry genuine romantic stakes with atmospheric horror — think Gothic dread, paranormal threat, and a love story that actually matters. The tone she's chasing sits in the same emotional register as Crimson Peak: lush, eerie, and emotionally devastating.
Paranormal romance is a core strength of the list she's building. She specifically calls out romance featuring paranormal investigators as a fresh angle she's eager to find, and she's on record wanting the next long-running paranormal romance series in the vein of the Argeneau series — suggesting she values serializable, world-rich concepts over standalones here.
Fast-moving, high-stakes romance with adventure at its spine. She points to classic adventure-romance energy — treasure hunts, globe-trotting, propulsive plotting — as the sweet spot. Writers should think about the thrill of the chase alongside the romantic arc.
Two specific contemporary niches she's actively hunting: romance set inside competitive reality TV productions (elimination-format shows in particular) and cowboy romance written with a deliberate female gaze — she wants the rugged-ranch dynamic reimagined for a modern female readership rather than the traditional male-heroics framing.
Beyond horrormance, she wants standalone adult horror that is Gothic or paranormal in nature. Haunted estates, creepy cults, ghost stories, and supernatural dread all qualify. She is not looking for body horror, gore, or extreme horror — the emphasis is on atmosphere, psychological unease, and the uncanny.
Specifically female-centered retellings of myths and folklore, set anywhere from antiquity through the early modern period. Her medieval studies background means she reads this sub-genre with real editorial depth — fresh source material and underrepresented mythologies will stand out. She is not looking for standard historical fiction without a retelling or folkloric element.
Adult domestic suspense is on her list as an accepted category, though she emphasizes romance and horror more heavily in her public statements. Writers in this space should lean into psychological tension and close-quarters relationship dynamics.
Romantic suspense and category romance round out her romance slate. These are welcomed but sit behind her loudest priorities (paranormal, adventure, horrormance). Strong genre execution matters more than a high-concept hook here.
Not the right fit
On Christina's list
Taste fingerprint
How to query Christina
Her form is closed as of May 27, 2026 — check the live status at her agency's website before doing anything else. Submitting to a closed form wastes your query.
Lead your query letter with genre first: she represents a narrow slice of adult fiction, and she needs to know immediately that your book is one of her eight accepted categories.
If you're writing horrormance, name it as such and lean into what makes it genuinely horrifying, not just spooky-adjacent — she wants real dread alongside the romance.
For paranormal romance series pitches, signal the series potential early; her Argeneau-series callout suggests she's thinking about long-term commercial builds, not just book one.
Mythology and folklore retellings should specify the source tradition and time period in the first paragraph — 'ancient through early modern' is the window, and underrepresented traditions will differentiate your pitch.
Cowboy romance queries should actively flag the female gaze framing — she's reacting against a familiar trope, so show her you know the distinction.
Avoid blending in sci-fi, fantasy world-building, or romantasy elements even as secondary flavors — she explicitly does not want those categories and is unlikely to make exceptions.
Her media touchstones (Crimson Peak, The Mummy, Yellowstone, Penny Dreadful, The Last Kingdom) are a useful calibration tool: if your book's tone aligns with one of these, a brief, specific comp to that work can resonate.