out of her seat and demanded to know what had made me smile. If I furrowed my brow, she'd lunge across the desk and demand an explanation, as if I were a suspect in a major crime. At one point I laughed, and when I looked up in anticipation of her inquisition, she just smiled and gazed out the window, as if suddenly supremely confident of her powers. Only ten seconds later she asked, "Where are you now?" and "What was the line that made you laugh?" Since then, when others have tried to get me to read while they waited, I have flatly refused, explaining that they won't be able to sit with every person who buys their book, and gauge the reactions. Reading, I like to remind them, is not a team sport. "Once they've finished a new manuscript and put it in the mail," continued Gottlieb, "they exist in a state of suspended emotional and psychic animation until they hear from their editor, and it's cruelty to animals to keep them waiting." Most writers become fairly agitated awaiting a response from the editor. Some have been known to decompose completely during the waiting period. They are parents anxiously pacing outside the intensive care unit, who care about just one thing: Is my baby going to make it? What they often don't realize is that in today's publishing climate, editors are required to do far more than edit their books. They must serve as mini-publishers for each of their titles, which means that their time and energies are always stretched exceedingly thin. A s a result, taking on a new author can sometimes feel like adding an eleventh child to a family of ten. Happy as Mom is for the new baby, she's not sure where she'll find the time to nurture her or the food to feed her. The
