Sharlene Martin is a literary agent with Martin Literary Management. Sharlene Martin began her business career in 1985 by founding Helping Hands, an employee placement agency, and shortly thereafter was named Entrepreneur MagazineÕs Homebased Entrepreneur of the Year. That led to the Harvard Business School using her agency, Helping Hands, as a case study for their students.
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Born, raised and schooled in Connecticut, she was later recognized with the title of Entrepreneur of the Year by the Connecticut Chamber of Commerce. She was also honored and presented with the Spirited Woman Award in New York City in 1987 by Sherry Lansing for supporting women in the workplace. Sharlene sold her company when she moved to California in 1990 and spent several years at various key creative positions in the entertainment industry while raising her two children. In 2003, after a meeting with a screenwriter/author (who later became her husband!) she was encouraged to form her own literary agency—Martin Literary & Media Management.
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She chose to primarily represent adult nonfiction, a genre she continues to love to this day, although Martin Literary & Media Management has a team of eight who represent all popular genres of books.
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Sharlene has represented some of the top true crime books in publishing and conducts her business with a strict policy that any crime-related book she represents must always be told to benefit the victim, never the perpetrator.

Many of Sharlene’s authors have had their books boosted as serial reprints in prestigious publications such as Readers’ Digest, People Magazine, WHO, and the London Times. Other client appearances include 60 Minutes, The TODAY Show, The View, Fox and Friends, Good Morning America, The Early Show, 20/20, 48 Hours, Discovery Channel, Inside Edition, The 700 Club, ET, The Insider, ABC Nightline, Dr. Phil, Anderson Cooper 360, CNN, HLN, Discovery ID and Fox News and the former OPRAH show.
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She is actively doing business with major film and TV companies for adaptations of her clients’ books, and shares the MLM Book to Film-TV Rights Catalog with key people in the entertainment industry on a quarterly basis. ItÕs also updated with new sales weekly at http://www.MartinLit.com/film-tv.
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Sharlene is a member of the Producers Guild of America (pga), and has adapted books from MLM clients including one of the top Hallmark Hall of Fame’s acclaimed movie, Front of the Class, starring the late
Treat Williams, Patricia Heaton and James Wolk.