Launch Pad Alum Amber Alexander Signs With Jeff Portnoy at Bellevue Productions

Launch Pad alum Amber Alexander has signed with literary manager Jeff Portnoy at Bellevue Productions, the Tracking Board has learned.

Alexander’s fantasy-romance manuscript Beautifully Damned placed in the Top 50 of the 2017 Launch Pad Manuscript Competition. Described as a cross between Twilight and True Blood, the YA story follows two immortal beings who are living as teenagers as they fight to find each other while struggling against the systematic persecution of humans with magical powers across America.

At the time, the LPMC’s judges said that Beautifully Damned is “a well-crafted and layered story with both enormous scope and intimate emotion… Politically relevant themes of oppression, health care, and prejudice make this a topical and intelligent YA novel that could make headlines and bestseller lists at the same time.”

Alexander wrote a pilot titled Bad Witches that’s based on her own manuscript, and which was chosen as a 2017 Blood List Fresh Blood Select.

Alexander hails from a small town in rural northern Canada. She fell in love words and stories as a teen when she discovered the power of a library card. For the past 10 years, she has worked in professional theatre as a producer, administrator, publicist and creator, as well as an arts facilitator, helping to create arts-based mentorship opportunities for marginalized youth and communities. She’s led story creation programs with young people in prisons and gangs, and even child soldiers. It was those experiences that inspired her to write YA fiction, as she wants teens from all backgrounds to see themselves represented in books, films and on TV.

Alexander is a graduate of UCLA’s professional screenwriting program, where she was nominated for the Nate Wilson award for Best Screenplay. She currently works in senior management for the largest Fringe Festival in North America. She’s also been working with Portnoy on a rewrite of a featured script on the Black List website that was a finalist for the Verizon go90 award. They plan to take the spec out on the market soon.

 Jeff Sneider | Editor in Chief