Success Stories

Liz Treacher – The Unravelling

Skelbo Press, 2020

For Ella Aldridge, life was supposed to be exciting. Thirty years on, she’s stuck in the suburbs in a boring job and a failing marriage. But a sinister encounter on platform three is about to change everything. Under the watchful eye of a shadowy ticket inspector, Ella finds herself spiralling into a murky underworld on an extraordinary journey that touches everyone around her, forcing her to confront the biggest question of all.

By turns poignant, chilling and tinged with dark humour, The Unravelling is a novel full of heart and beauty, about the myth and magic of everyday life, and the sacrifices we make for what really matters.

“If it feels like your novel has ‘run aground’, then Helen is the editor for you. Her detailed report helped to breathe new life into the manuscript and her analysis of my three act structure was a game-changer. She is gentle yet precise, generous and honest. It felt like she brought out the best in the novel and the best in me as a writer.” ~Liz Treacher

Michaela Foster Marsh – Starchild

Story Plant, 2020

STARCHILD is a memoir about the intimacies of siblinghood and the complexities of multi-racial adoption. It is the story of the unique connection of extended family and commitment to an adopted homeland. It is the story of long-held secrets revealed and barriers broken. And it is ultimately the story of a sibling relationship that transcends borders, time, and life itself.

“STARCHILD is an odyssey; a spiritual voyage of self-discovery.” ~Peter McDougal, BAFTA award-winning screenwriter

“Part detective novel, part intense soul-searching about the realities of adoption, and part travelogue.” ~Ken Smith, Herald

Kate Tough – Keep Walking, Rhona Beech

Abacus, 2019

Nothing has turned out quite how Rhona Beech thought: she’s been swapping one so-so job for another on an annual basis and now her nine-year relationship has ended. When her efforts to adjust are thrown entirely up in the air by some unwelcome news, Rhona has to think again. Her sardonic, funny, poignant attempts to find an answer to the questions she’s facing are helped by a cast of friends, strangers and trained professionals. Funny and tender, Keep Walking, Rhona Beech is a brilliantly observant satire on relationships, friendship and life.

“Tough has a brilliant way with everyday realism.” ~Mary Paulson-Ellis

John K Fulton – The Wreck Of The Argyll

Cranachan, 2018

Winner of the Great War Dundee Children’s Book Prize

Dundee, 1915. Twelve-year-old Nancy Caird is desperate to do her bit for the war. So when she suspects one of her teachers of being a German spy, she’s determined to foil his plans, and ropes in the reluctant Jamie Balfour to help her uncover the scheme. When Nancy and Jamie’s suspicions are confirmed, they’re drawn into a web of espionage, secrets, and betrayal.

“An exciting and fast-paced spy thriller; The Wreck of the Argyll is my kind of story.” ~Allan Burnett

Ever Dundas – Goblin

Saraband, 2017

Ian McEwan’s Atonement meets Guillermo del Toro’s Pan’s Labyrinth in this extraordinary debut.

Goblin is an outcast girl growing up in London during World War 2. After witnessing a shocking event she increasingly takes refuge in a self-constructed but magical imaginary world. Having been rejected by her mother, she leads a feral life amidst the craters of London’s Blitz, and takes comfort in her family of animals, abandoned pets she’s rescued from London’s streets.

“A terrific debut novel… a meditation on trauma and loss that brims with wild joy.” ~The Guardian
“One of the standout debuts of the year.” ~The Herald

Edited by Helen Sedgwick for Jenny Brown Associates.

Fiona Cameron – A Way of Knowing

Flying Swan Press, 2016

Despite having been married three times, Lenka Majewska has never fallen out of love with Cluny Crichton, the handsome Highland laird’s son she wed at eighteen and left less than a year later. Recently widowed, the last thing Lenka expects is for Cluny to stride back into her life – and to find that she wants him there. But Lenka knows now what she didn’t know in 1968: they should never have married in the first place. Can she find the words to tell him? Should she, or are some secrets best kept?

“A fascinating and unusual love story about the nature of love and of identity.” ~Sue Krekorian

C A Mitchell – Commander

Available on Amazon, 2016

The corrupt and unscrupulous Hand controls the galaxy, whether everyone knows it or not. Yet the Hand is simply the puppet of a greater, more mysterious enemy, who would ravage systems and enlist all advanced species to fight in catastrophic intergalactic war…

Abigail De Silva is a fighter. She’s survived civil conflict, displacement, an unsteady upbringing, and she’s confident she can look after herself. But when Abi steals aboard a spaceship travelling far across the stars, she must learn to get on with the ship’s captain.

Rob Newman – The Entirely Accurate Encyclopaedia of Evolution

Cargo Publishing, 2015

Now a BBC Radio 4 comedy series, the Entirely Accurate Encyclopaedia of Evolution is based on the stand up show Robert Newman’s New Theory of Evolution, and was edited by Helen Sedgwick.

“…enlightening and beautiful…”  Russell Brand

“… funnier than ever…” Stewart Lee

“A sustained, witty swipe at Dawkins’s world-view… You see that chink of light in the dark, overcast sky, that’s you that is.”  Daily Telegraph

Colette Victor – What To Do With Lobsters In A Place Like Klippiesfontein

Cargo Publishing, 2015

Runner-up in the Dundee International Book prize.

The arrival of a tank of lobsters in a local shop in Klippiesfontein, South Africa, sets the community talking. Local kids and adults watch on with fascinated delight, but an undercurrent of suspicion and dislike soon begins to surface – and it’s not all about the lobsters. In a town troubled by lingering racism, prejudice, and poverty, some people show their worst traits while others shine through with humour and affection. A funny and touching story of friendship, marriage, kindness, redemption, and brightly coloured shellfish.

Philip Miller – The Blue Horse

Freight Books, 2015

A highly atmospheric, unsettling literary noir about pain, loss and recovery set in the contemporary art world.

“I was disturbed… interesting and convincing” ~Alasdair Gray

“What swept me along with the book was that it was a terrific description of grief… It’s quite visceral, there’s quite a lot sex, of drunkenness, of people behaving badly, I thought: this is great. There are very funny moments… George Newhouse just leapt off the page for me.” ~Janice Forsyth, BBC Radio Scotland

Margaret Montgomery – Beauty Tips For Girls

Cargo Publishing, 2015

Katy is an impressionable teenager obsessed with Misty magazine and its beauty tips. With her once-glamorous mother, Corinne, spiralling into self-destruction, she turns to Misty for advice, with disastrous but often hilarious consequences. Only Katy’s teacher, Jane, has the insight to put her pupil back on track, but can these three very different women each find their own voice in a society obsessed with perfection?

“A true gem. Don’t be fooled: although immensely readable and full of wry humour, Beauty Tips For Girls’ unflinching observation cuts to the bone.” ~Kirsty Logan

Fiona Cameron – By Heart

Flying Swan Press, 2015

Longlisted for the Mslexia Novel Competition in 2015.

On her eleventh birthday, Lucy Simmons dances with Richard Rainey, the man who is about to marry her sister. It marks the end of a bleak and lonely childhood. Lucy feels loved and valued for the first time in her life. All through her adolescence, Richard is, as she tells her best friend, ‘her rock’, her confidant, the one person who’s always there for her.

But once Lucy’s grown up and married to Mark, the relationship with her brother-in-law takes a more sinister turn. Will her marriage and her family survive?

C A Mitchell – Castle

Available on Amazon, 2015

No one likes to spend time with Kat, because Kat can see the dead. Arriving in Edinburgh to study History, she vows to keep her Sight a secret and live a normal life. But she is soon drawn to the city’s historic heart, where spirits roam the cobbles and the bloody past comes alive. There, in the shadows of the Old Town, she meets James — a mysterious psychic who comforts troubled ghosts, who could really use her help…

Castle is a standalone paranormal romance, set in Scotland’s haunted capital.

Nick Brooks – Indecent Acts

Freight Books, 2014

An extraordinary achievement and change of direction for Brooks, in this, his third novel. Reported entirely by the protagonist, Grace, a semi-illiterate 40-something mother from Drumchapel, one of Glasgow’s most notorious schemes, this is a story soaked in humour and empathy as we follow Grace’s attempts to hold together her precarious, chaotic family life.

“Flawlessly tapping into the psyche of this jaded and middle-aged woman, Brooks presents us with a true working class character…” The Skinny

Kate Tough – Head for the Edge, Keep Walking

Cargo Publishing, 2014

Jill Beech’s nine-year relationship is over. She covers the sadness with madness, going dancing with her off-beat friends and attempting a series of hilariously bad internet dates. Then life is flipped on its head once more by some shocking news. Adrift in her mid-thirties, no-one does ‘lost’ quite like Jill. Wry, witty, resilient but bewildered, she is left asking, what does it take to stay sane in this life?

“A warm and ferociously witty story of the s*** life throws at us and how we survive it.” Zoë Strachan

Anneliese Mackintosh – Any Other Mouth

Freight Books, 2014

Winner of the Green Carnation Prize 2014

Shortlisted for the Saltire First Book Prize

A viciously funny and heart-breaking collection of semi-autobiographical short stories from one of the UK’s most exciting new voices.

Any Other Mouth is a gut-wrenching and shockingly frank account of sexual misadventure, familial disintegration, bereavement and self-discovery, in the vein of David Vann’s Legend of a Suicide, Susanna Kaysen’s Girl, Interrupted, and Miranda July’s Nobody Belongs Here More Than You.

“It’s one of the saddest yet most uplifting things I’ve read in ages and it made me cry. Mackintosh is a real talent and Any Other Mouth is a remarkable debut.” ~The Independent

Fiona Cameron – White Cranes Dancing

Flying Swan Press, 2014

Serena MacKenzie is a successful TV journalist, but she has never shaken off the obsessions that have gripped her since her childhood in the dysfunctional MacKenzie family of Balvaig: fairy tale heroes, all things Russian, and her grandparents’ disapproval. It’s 1997, and she’s newly divorced. When a friend persuades her to join a cruise to St Petersburg, it seems just the treat she has told herself she deserves. Over the space of a few heady days in the queen of Baltic cities, she meets Russian musician Max Grigoriev and brings him home with her, illegally. But Max’s personality is as flawed as Serena’s, and he has his own agenda; life with him turns out to be anything but a fairy tale.

Bill Doig – Minor Mishaps

Published in Print, 2014

A collection of short stories.

Funny, warm, insightful, honest and hugely enjoyable, these are truly memorable stories of Scotland as it has changed of the decades, and over a lifetime.

Jim Blyth – Kim and Jim

Boorach Books, 2014

A novel in verse.

Some say that life begins at forty. For others, it begins again when the kids grow up and leave home. So why are Kim & Jim sitting on their own watching TV on a wet Friday night in Paisley? “…witty, surprising, and a veritable delight to read.”

Fiona Cameron – The Swan Widow

Flying Swan Press, 2014

A woman who’s been single all her life can’t suddenly find love in her sixties…. That’s what retired teacher Peigi MacKenzie believes. But the responsibility of looking after her late niece’s two young children isn’t what she had planned. She’s looking for a way to reinvent herself… When out of the blue, she meets Liverpudlian ex-policeman Kevin Phillipis. She throws caution to the winds, and within months has agreed to marry Kevin. But when everything starts to go wrong, there’s a voice echoing in Peigi’s head – her Free Kirk preacher father’s: ‘Happiness is a signal from the Devil that he’s looking to trip you up.’

Pippa Goldschmidt – The Falling Sky

Freight Books, 2013

Runner-up in the 2012 Dundee International Book Prize

Pippa Goldschmidt’s bittersweet debut novel blends black comedy, heart-breaking tragedy and fascinatingly accessible science, in this intricate and beautiful examination of one woman’s disintegration and journey to redemption.

“A delicate and fascinating study of a life in which intellect and external microscopic and cosmic fields interact.” ~Stephen Fry

Lucy J. Hamilton – Milan to Tokyo

Available on Amazon, 2013

This trans-continental debut novel explores friendship across cultures. Speaking about the Full Editorial Service, Lucy says:

“Ideas? I have hundreds of them. Another matter is to capture all those thoughts, images, and emotions, on a page. Thanks to Helen, I had the strength to finish writing my first novel, which I hope will be published soon. Working with an editor was not only helpful with syntax, grammar and format. As far as I am concerned, it was complete 100% support. She gave me the drive to continue without giving up. Thank you, Helen.”

Suzanne Egerton – Out Late with Friends and Regrets

Paddy’s Daddy Publishing, 2013

Suzanne Egerton’s debut novel charts the journey of newly-widowed, 37-year-old Fiona, as she explores her sexuality and builds new friendships that change her world.

Speaking about Wildland’s Blitz The Book service, Suzanne says:

“The editorial advice I received was incisive, insightful, and unflinching. But I would have to add massively encouraging, too. Helen’s tough love shows the respect for your work that the committed writer craves: no diplomatic omissions, just the shiny new tools to craft your book into the very best product it can possibly be. The editing she did on my manuscript excited and re-energised me; I thoroughly recommend her services.”

The Elsewhere Collection

McSweeney’s, EIBF & Cargo Publishing, 2012

The Elsewhere collection is a box set of four themed volumes of new writing from fifty internationally acclaimed authors including Amy Bloom, Roddy Doyle, Ali Smith and Michael Morpurgo. Elsewhere was commissioned in 2010 by the Edinburgh International Book Festival, and its publication marks an innovative publishing and design collaboration between Glasgow-based publisher Cargo and US-based McSweeney’s.

Wildland founder Helen Sedgwick was the managing editor for the collection.

Toni Davidson – My Gun Was As Tall As Me

Freight Books, 2012

Acclaimed for his shocking, groundbreaking debut, Scar Culture, Toni Davidson’s long-awaited second novel is at once tender, harrowing, deeply moving and utterly compelling. An epic story of family disintegration, state-sponsored persecution and the irreconcilable compromises of delivering aid, Davidson assembles an enthralling cast of characters, beguiling and wholly authentic in equal measure. My Gun Was As Tall As Me is a meticulously researched, gripping and truly unforgettable story of conflict, damaged childhood, redemption and self-discovery, unlike anything you will have ever read before.

“My Gun Was As Tall As Me bears witness to the moral complexities attending the soul-shredding plights of internally displaced people and those trying to help them. For anyone who would make a difference in the world, this novel should be required reading.” ~Jim Dodge

Martha Payne and David Payne – NeverSeconds

Cargo Publishing, 2012

Winner of The Herald Public Campaigner of The Year
Winner of Liberty Human Rights Young Person Of The Year
Top 25 Blogs of 2012 –TIME Magazine

Wildland founder Helen Sedgwick was the editor of this inspirational book that tells the true story behind nine-year-old Martha’s amazing blog.

“Martha is such an inspiration to anyone who wants to make a difference. She is a true hero.” ~Jamie Oliver

Allan Fraser – The Five Senses

Five protagonists, with five very different points of view, each explore the importance of the senses in their lives. Moving through war and peace, history, family life, friendship and revenge, this story challenges us to consider what makes us who we are. Based on the author’s real life experience with blindness, The Five Senses is a remarkable book.

Allan Fraser chose the Literary Consultancy service, and worked closely with Helen Sedgwick over the course of 2010.

Drumchapel Focal Point Centre – The Girnin Gates

Culture & Sport Glasgow 2009

From winning the local lottery to making floats for gala day, this warm, affectionate collection portrays the changing ways of life in Drumchapel by remembering the past, looking to the future and most of all making you laugh.

The Girnin Gates is a collection of short stories produced during a writing course in Drumchapel in 2009, tutored and edited by Helen Sedgwick.