Another Trek shake-up, another veteran gone

Recent whispers of cutbacks at Pocket Books reaching to Margaret Clark, the 13-year veteran and last of the specialized Trek editors (for now), finally burst out on the record this week as part of a larger overall cut at Simon & Schuster. It's similar to the one that claimed her colleague Marco Palmieri a year ago, and the 2007 wipeout of the longtime startrek.com staff at CBS Interactive I worked with most recently. It's all unsettling news in what we'd prefer to have as a cozy little status quo in Trekland.

With this last cutback, Pocket/Simon & Schuster pledges to carry on the Trek license, hold to plans already made, and announce the new assignment among its remaining editors soon, but for now we tip our hat to Margaret for her years at the helm—including interfacing on the last edition of the TNG Companion and, to a smaller extent, our help on Geoff Mandel's Star Maps, much less the magazines' news and blurbs over the years.

It's not always an easy job, working under such a harshly specialized microscope while guessing at the growing or shrinking Trekfan market demands and answering to all those involved on the business side. We wish all good things for both Margaret, as she finds her next calling, as well as the Trek line's future at Pocket—and any potential changes in process it may take.