Little, Brown Books for Young Readers has announced that publishing veteran Margaret Raymo will join the company as executive editor, effective September 7. Raymo was most recently senior editorial director at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, where she worked for more than three decades in a variety of editorial positions.
In her new role, Raymo will acquire and edit fiction and nonfiction titles across all ages, reporting to v-p and editor-in-chief Alvina Ling. She will be working remotely from her home in Boston.
At HMH, Raymo cofounded the Versify imprint with Kwame Alexander, who is also moving to LBYR. Throughout her career, Raymo has published such titles as The Crossover by Alexander, which won the Newbery Award and a Coretta Scott King Honor and has sold more than one million copies; The Undefeated by Alexander, illustrated by Kadir Nelson, winner of the Caldecott Medal, a Newbery Honor, and the Coretta Scott King Illustrator Award; Son, the final novel in Lois Lowry's Newbery Award-winning and bestselling series The Giver Quartet; and ¡Vamos! Let's Go to the Market and ¡Vamos! Let’s Go Eat by Raúl the Third, which won a Pura Bulpré Illustrator Honor Book and Pura Bulpré Illustrator Medal, respectively. Some of the other notable authors and illustrators she has edited include Veronica Chambers, Joelle Charbonneau, Lamar Giles, Steve Jenkins, Nic and David Sheff, and Chris Van Allsburg.
Raymo told PW, “I am thrilled to start this new chapter at Little, Brown Books for Young Readers. In a way I’ve come full circle as one of my first publishing job interviews ever was at Little, Brown at their Joy Street office in Boston. Back then, you had to take a typing test and I think I failed it. Now that I’ve improved my typing and editing skills after 34 years at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, I look forward to developing a new list at LBYR, a list that continues their tradition of literary excellence, publishing both established and debut authors. I’ve long admired their top-notch slate of editors and stellar marketing team, and I’m excited to join this illustrious company.”
