I came back from a recent trip to the mainland to find a nice pileup of book mail—complimentary copies of books I’ve worked on, kindly sent along by the publishers. Here’s a sampling of the most recent releases, clockwise from the top left:
From Breakwater Books in St. John’s, NL, Monica Kidd’s new novel, The Crane, released in February. I first got to work with Monica about fifteen years ago in my Gaspereau Press days on her debut poetry collection, Actualities and it was a joy to work with her again (and oh does she work). The Crane has been getting some excellent reviews, including this one in Alberta Views.
From Uphill Books in Washington State, Utahn Brooke Williams’s debut, Encountering Dragonfly, which launched in April is one of the most unusual non-fiction manuscripts I’ve had the pleasure of working on. You can read an excerpt that ran in Orion magazine, and see for yourself here.
From Heritage House Publishing, here in Victoria, Manitoba journalist Rosalie Tennison’s memoir Naomi’s Houses, which tells the story of her family’s life through the series of houses her mother secured for them. I had a great time working on the edits with Rosalie, talking about grocery bills and small-town life and how exactly to wind up a memoir (it’s tricky!). You can watch Rosalie’s CTV appearance from early April here.
and from my former day job, TouchWood Editions, also based here in town, the latest instalment in Iona Whishaw’s bestselling Lane Winslow mystery series, The Cost of a Hostage. During my time in-house at TouchWood I got to be the point person for all the little editorial details that accumulate in a long-running series with a strong fanbase. And I must admit I kind of miss parts of that. But I still get to keep my hand in, and so here is the latest, number twelve. You can read series enthusiast Kerry Clare’s review of it here.
