Stephen King calls him the finest science fiction author now writing, but Robert Charles Wilson is hardly a household name in Canada. The June issue of Q&Q profiles an author at the height of his powers who is beginning to garner mainstream attention. Also in the issue, we look at how publishing schools justify maintaining enrolment levels even as the job market dries up, and we examine a trend many authors and agents find alarming: the decline of in-house editing.

22nd century man

Robert Charles Wilson rises through the ranks of sci-fi respectability

School’s still in

In a world of ever-decreasing employment opportunities, Canadian publishing schools are coming up with new ways to justify enrolment levels

Secretly Canadian

How did the faculty of Vermont College, one of the only schools in North America to offer an MFA in writing for children and young adults, become one-third Canuck?

Editors-for-hire

With publishers more pressed for time than ever before, authors are increasingly turning to freelancers for real, substantive editorial work. Is this the end of in-house editing?

IN MEMORIAM: DEREK WEILER, 1968-2009

FRONTMATTER

¢    Callaghan goes back to the beginning

¢    Don Calame: from L.A. to YA

¢    Kids Can picks up Ninja Cowboy Bear

¢    Cover to Cover: Heather Waldorf’s Leftovers

¢    Snapshot: Sarah Yu of the B.C.-based Self-Counsel Press

¢    Emily St. John Mandel: A Canadian in the Brooklyn lit scene

¢    Local Buzz: Saskatoon self-help

REVIEWS

¢    Going Ashore by Mavis Gallant

¢    The Incident Report by Martha Baillie

¢    True Patriot Love: Four Generations in Search of Canada by Michael Ignatieff

¢    Plus more fiction, non-fiction, and poetry

BOOKS FOR YOUNG PEOPLE

¢    The Queen of Paradise’s Garden by Andy Jones and Darka Erdelji

¢    The King’s Taster by Kenneth Oppel, Steve Johnson, and Lou Fancher

¢    Tell Me Why: How Young People Can Change the World by Eric Walters

¢    Plus more fiction, non-fiction, and picture books

THE Q&Q/BOOKNET CANADA BESTSELLERS

THE LAST WORD

Authors have few options when hit with a negative review, writes Allan Levine