The first two chapters of the just published The Tattooed Witch by Susan MacGregor (August 1, 2013) are available on Susan’s site, Suzenyms. I, (Robert Runte) was the editor for the final version of this novel, though another editorial team had already done the initial developmental work on this one, so it was pretty clean when I got it. And of course, Susan is herself a well known editor (with On SpecMagazine), so I imagine it was pretty smooth writing from the get go. Really looking forward to editing the next two books in this series, the second volume of which is already waiting on my desk.

Currently in my “to do” pile:

• have to write the “Afterword” for Leslie Gadallah’s The Legend of Sarah (due out Winter 2014)
• final edit on My Life as a Troll by Susan Bohnet (due out Spring 2014)
• initial edit on Alicia Hargreaves The Secret Women’s Club
• initial edit on Shakespeare for Readers’ Theatre, Volume 2 by John Poulsen
• initial edit on The Tatooded Seer by Susan MacGregor
• Volume 2 in Michell Plested’s Mik Murdoch: Boy Superhero series
• initial re-edits on 21 books in the Prime Ministers of Canada series

I also have two solicited manuscripts for review which I can’t talk about until/if we sign contracts. And I’m off to When Words Collide convention in Calgary (August 9-11, 2013) where a number of authors have signed up to pitch books to Five Rivers, so may get one or two more submissions there. (WWC is a great convention for authors and editors: I get more business done there than at any other convention.)

(Okay, not an actual picture of my desk. The actual manuscripts are all Word Files on my computer. Nobody accepts paper manuscripts anymore. But, you know, there’s no photo for that.)
So…29 manuscripts currently on my desk, but that’s much less of a backlog than usual. With the kids out of school in August and family vacation, probably won’t get a lot done until Sept, but this lot should be off my desk by mid-October at the latest.

Oh, and that’s not counting the four graduate students I have working on their theses for me. In fact, here is a great Pinterest site by one of my grad students on 400 children’s books to aid children through grieving. (Pininterest beats the hell out of asking for a traditional literature review, eh?)