Signature Editions

Karen Haughian

Publisher

Signature Editions is committed to discovering and developing new Canadian writing of literary merit, regardless of genre. We publish many first-book authors and work with them to develop their craft. Prose titles are edited in-house by owner/editor Karen Haughian, who has a Master's degree in English as well as five years' experience teaching English at Concordia University in addition to the hands-on experience of editing manuscripts gained through 22 years of publishing. Fiction, non-fiction and drama selections are made by Karen.

Samantha Beiko

Marketing Assistant

Samantha Beiko studied Canadian Book Publishing at Humber College in Toronto, and has worked in the publishing industry in a Jill-of-All-Trades capacity, jumping from editorial, layout and design, marketing and promotions, and even book sales. Aside from publishing, Samantha is also a writer and editor. Her first book, a young adult fantasy novel titled The Lake and the Library, will be released through ECW Press in Spring 2013. Samantha will also be editing Imaginarium 2013: The Best Canadian Speculative Writing for ChiZine Publications this year, as well as in 2014.

Kit Brennan

Drama Editor

Editor Kit Brennan is a nationally produced playwright, as well as professor and coordinator of the BFA Major in Playwriting program at Concordia University’s Theatre Department. She also teaches Storytelling, Oral Histories and Narrative Tradition, and Performing Stories, for Concordia’s Theatre and Development BFA program, a specialization which emphasizes the value of theatre in classrooms and communities to inform personal and social change. Brennan is editor of an ongoing series of new Canadian play anthologies, beginning with Going It Alone: Plays by Women for Solo Performers with Nuage Editions, and continuing for Signature Editions with Two Hands Clapping: New Plays for Two Actors, Three on the Boards: New Plays for Three Actors, a two volume collection of theatre for young people, grades one through twelve — Things That Go Bump, Vol. 1, Plays for Young Adults, and Things That Go Bump, Volume 2, Plays for Young Audiences — and most recently, Out on a Limb: Short Plays by New Playwrights, showcasing work by young writers studying playwriting at universities and professional theatre programs across Canada. 

Clarise Foster

2012 Guest Poetry Editor

Clarise Foster is the author of two poetry collections, The Flame Tree (1998) and The Way Boys Sometimes Are (2006). Her poetry has also appeared in various Canadian literary journals and her reviews have been published in The Globe and Mail and The Malahat Review. Clarise lives and works in Winnipeg, where she is the editor of Contemporary Verse 2: The Canadian Journal of Poetry and Critical Writing and the poetry editor of The Muses' Company.

George Payerle

2012 Guest Poetry Editor

George Payerle is a Vancouver-born novelist, poet, translator and editor. His books include three chapbooks, Wolfbane Fane (1977),  Two from Babylon (1990), The Weather and That (1993), two novels, the afterpeople (1970) and Unknown Soldier (1987), which is widely regarded as the definitive expression of a combat veteran’s experience in civilian life, as well as two books of poetry, The Last Trip to Oregon (2002), and Alterations (2004). His work has also appeared widely in periodicals, anthologies and on radio. Among his many editing projects have been works by poets Dennis Lee and George Amabile, and novelists Andreas Schroeder and David Waltner-Toews.

Doug Whiteway

Mystery Editor

Doug Whiteway joined Signature Editions in 2005 when we brought out Death in Cold Type, a mystery that unfolds at a Winnipeg newspaper, which was published under Doug's nom de plume, C.C. Benison. He was an editor at The Beaver, Canada's History Magazine from 1998 to 2007, and has earned acclaim for his Jane Bee series, Her Majesty Investigates. He has also recently completed a term as the writer-in-residence at the Winnipeg Public Library. Doug's latest book is Twelve Drummers Drumming, a Father Christmas mystery.