Transworld acquires 'wild' account of remote island living

Transworld has acquired Tamsin Calidas’s I Am An Island, her account of 15 years living on a croft on a remote island in the Hebrides.

With plans to publish in spring 2020, Susanna Wadeson, head of non-fiction at Transworld, secured UK and Commonwealth rights plus audio from Sarah Williams at the Sophie Hicks Agency. German rights have been pre-empted by Harper Collins.

In the book Calidas describes how what began as "a crazy dream" grew into "ever-increasing isolation" after her husband leaves.

Wadeson called it "wild, startling and very moving" and Calidas's writing "visceral and extraordinarily beautiful". "This is an account of being stripped right back, of becoming a raw element of an often harsh landscape. It is about living on the extreme edge. But Tamsin also has powerful things to say about friendship – and resilience," she said.

Calidas said: "Finding such a wonderful home shore for my book is a dream come true. It’s as if coming in from the salt-stung Atlantic and wild gusting skies of the islands to Susanna’s team at Transworld is the start of a whole new adventure, all over again."