One of my favorite people on Earth is gone.

One of my favorite pictures of Helga, collecting a literal pile of awards on CamCat’s behalf at the Ben Franklin’s one year.

I knew Helga Schier for a couple years before she became the editor for Ghost Tamer, and I liked her immediately and grew to love her, as I think everyone who knew her did.

I started working at CamCat as a publishing assistant in December of 2020. As a former actor and on-again-off-again narrator, the audio department was transitioned to me right away. Helga had been in the publishing industry for decades at that point, but both her husband and son were actors, so she was very close to the business. When I first started sending out audition recordings and compiling opinions, Helga always made a point to ask me my thoughts.

I would tell her, but usually follow up with, “I’m not sure my opinion is relevant.”

“It is very relevant. You are an actor. You listen to audiobooks. This is your department.”

She did that often. If a team member held back during a discussion, she made a point to ask them what they thought. And if she disagreed, she would say so, but never in a way that made anyone feel as if their opinion wasn’t valid.

That was one of my favorite things about Helga. She was always encouraging—somehow able to give subtle pushes, guiding a person to grow almost in spite of themselves—but unfailingly honest. She would never bullshit if she didn’t agree or had concerns.

Helga liked running, champagne, and yoga; we had those things in common. When I ran my first race coming back from an injury, I posted the link to the online tracker in the company ‘Water Cooler’ chat, not really expecting anyone to pay attention. And even though she was on the West Coast and I was in CST, Helga tracked my race and messaged me afterward, telling me how impressed she was with my time. That was the first ‘little win’ of mine she celebrated, but by no means the last.

A team virtual cooking event we did several years ago around the holidays.

As a coworker, Helga always had an attitude of unruffled calm. Yes, she was honest if a situation were crappy, and I saw her roll her eyes more than once, but there was always a way through. It was never the end of the world. Not even close.

When I was promoted into the production role, I had some training with Cassandra, who held the position before me, but it was Helga who held my hand during those first few months when I was getting my feet under me. I mentioned that I was worried about screwing something up and she assured me that even if I did, “Nothing is ever so screwed up that it can’t be fixed.” It was a steep learning curve and frustrating for both of us at times, but even in those early stages, she encouraged me to make the role my own. “These are your files now. How do you want to arrange them?”

Helga had been in the industry for over 30 years and had worked with several publishers, including a big five, as well as having her own editorial side-business. One of the women in my writing group was published by CamCat and got Helga as her editor. She had nothing but great things to say about working with her. Another friend decided to pay Helga for her outside editorial services, and again, nothing but wonderful things to say. Every author who worked with her extolled her editorial eye in their acknowledgments. I would have loved to had her edit my work, but I didn’t have the money for her private services, and at the time, I wasn’t planning on submitting to CamCat.

I was doing things the normal way; on submission with agents. But in the early ‘20s I went through a rapid growth spurt in my writing. It was all I wanted to do and the ideas were just never ending. I was also in a few writing groups and the critiques were hitting right. My writing was in that stage where it was visibly improving. I would have a book on submission, but then the next book would be better, of course, so I wanted to put that one out instead. And as everyone knows, the submission process is long.

I was in a position to see the care that the CamCat authors were recieving, the awards they were winning, the book boxes they were included in, and I genuinely enjoyed reading the books. What if I submitted to a small press? I wasn’t going to stop writing. I could submit to publishers and look for an agent at the same time.

A screenshot of our last team meeting together.

When I looked around though, many small presses either weren’t accessible without an agent, or their website was fishy, they weren’t showcasing awards, weren’t producing as many versions of the book, etc. And the covers on the CamCat books have always been a cut above.

As soon as I started considering it, I reached out to Helga. Tentatively. Nervously. Maybe she’d discourage me? Maybe she’d say I wasn’t ready. She set up a video call with me within days to answer all of my questions. By the end of it, I was excited, and I truly believe that she was too.

There was a policy in place for any team member that wanted to submit to CamCat: the submission had to be anonymous, under a fake name, to avoid nepotism. Helga assured me that if my book was acquired, I could use my own name, it was just to ensure the acquisition remained unbiased. If I were rejected, I could stay anonymous, “and you’d get feedback.” Which was huge for me and, honestly, was what I was half-expecting, some feedback that might help me going forward.

Helga said to let her know when I submitted and under what name. She would be the only person aware of who I was, and if I made it to aquisitions, she would break it to the team.

I actually had fun making up a burner Submittable account and fabricating a new person. It was once I submitted my work that I had a panic attack. Because then I got to watch my book go throug the back end, and see the comments that people I worked with every day made about it. As if it were a stranger’s book.

I ate TUMS like candy.

Fortunately, Ghost Tamer was accepted.

I’ve saved this screenshot for over a year. I don’t think I’ll ever delete it.

I LOVED having Helga as an editor. All of those authors were right. I was thrilled by my first editorial call with her. I got to talk about my book for an hour with someone who got it and had a plan for it. Areas that I knew needed shoring up, but just didn’t know exactly where to go, were pin-pointed and the direction clearly illuminated by Helga. I was definitely spoiled having her as my first editor. My writing grew by leaps and bounds after working with her.

When it was selected for a book box, after having the cover designs run by me, she asked me if I was okay with it. I said, “Yeah. I have a book box!” and she replied, “And this is only the beginning.”

Anyone in this industry knows how many ‘nos’ a writer collects before receiving a ‘yes.’ When I submitted A Dagger of Lightning (again under a pseudonym) a few months after Ghost Tamer was published, it didn’t move as quickly. There was much more in the queue, so of course, I was anxious about it, but never said anything. Only Helga knew it was me, after all.

She messaged me about something work-related later at night, and since I was on the computer, I answered her. “Why are you still working?!” she asked. She was big on work/life balance for the rest of us, I’m not sure she ever stopped working herself. She loved the work and seemed to thrive on it. “I’m not working, I’m writing,” I said. “I just still had the window open.” A text message popped up on my phone moments later. “Since you are writing, I’ll just tell you. I took a peek at Dagger of Lightning today and I loved it. I wanted to keep reading. You really have a unique voice, Meredith.”

I am still collecting rejections from agents on the fourth manuscript I’ve gone out on submission with. (Although this one has also received some full requests to balance things out.) I’m sure I was collecting rejections on some submission at the time she messaged me, and I was definitely wondering if Ghost Tamer was a one-off and if I would never get another book published. Helga was under no obligation to tell me that she looked at my manuscript. Afterall, she would be silent during the aquisitions process unless it was accepted. But she must have known on some level how important it is to have someone you look up to tell you that your work is good. And mean it. Helga was always kind, but she never bullshitted anyone. I’ve carried those words with me since that evening.

In August of 2023, I prepared to attend my first Bouchercon in San Diego. It was going to be the first time I met Helga in person. I daydreamed about the trip for months beforehand, as you do when you’re excited. I thought about introducing Helga to my writing friends as ‘my awesome editor,’ how hard we would hug the first time we met, planning a dinner at some point during the trip, maybe I could even talk her into squeezing in a coffee… But Helga’s cancer came back right before Bouchercon. She had to have surgery and couldn’t make the trip. I never got that hug.

It’s hard to know what to do when something like that happens. Helga and I were more than coworkers, more than editor and author. But one of my personal flaws is the constant fear of “bothering” people and overstepping. Will she want people asking about her treatments? Will she be tired of that? If I don’t ask, will she think I don’t care? I googled “good gifts for people with cancer” and opted for a very soft blanket for her to take to chemo appointments. The amount of reviews I read about blankets was probably ridiculous.

“This is how I shall work henceforth,” is what she wrote to me.

But Helga sent me pictures of her with the blanket. And then later when I knitted her a hat, she sent me a picture of that also. I wish I still had the first picture she texted to me where she had on my poorly knitted, multicolored creation, but my phone storage is so bad that I regularly delete photos. It wasn’t a perfect hat, so I told her to wear it when she needed some whimsy in her life. I tried to make a better one later, lost the pattern, and got frustrated, so pulled my mother-in-law into the game. She crochets hats in mere minutes. I told her Helga’s favorite colors and paid for the shipping and we had more hats that she probably ever needed delievered. I’m sure she laughed at me. Actually, I hope she did. But I really didn’t know what to do from across the country.

She went into the hospital once with some complications and told us we shouldn’t worry. It was all routine. She was always trying to get work done from her hospital bed. That first time, I sent her funny videos and TikToks occasionally. I know now that she went in more times, but often she didn’t tell us. I found out later how many of her authors never knew she was sick. I think she probably only told us if she had to, either to keep us all from worrying or because she didn’t want to “complain.”

I never, ever let myself consider that she wasn’t going to get better. Because if Helga wasn’t there, we would all fall apart.

Helga at chemo in the goofy hat that I knitted.

On Tuesday, October 15th, we had a meeting. Helga had recently had oral surgery and couldn’t talk, but she would type her responses into the chat. She was completely herself. We actually thought she seemed like she was on the upswing. It was encouraging to see her getting stronger. We had three meetings that day. More than usual. I guess it’s nice that we got those extra minutes.

Thursday morning, her son Gabe—also in our CamCat family—texted the group chat to let us know that Helga was gone. He was in shock. My first text back was “No” then I sat down and ugly cried like I haven’t done in years. Yes, she was fighting cancer, yes, she was in her sixties, but this was too sudden. It was unexpected. She was getting better. She had plans.

The funeral was Wednesday, October 23rd. I couldn’t make it. Financially, it didn’t work, and emotionally, I was not ready. I didn’t want my only time seeing her ‘in person’ to be when she wasn’t really there. I have vivid, tangible memories of every funeral I’ve been to. I want to remember her as she was.

Because of Ghost Tamer’s subject matter, Helga and I actually talked about death and funerals, but I’m not quite sure what her views were on an afterlife. I know she didn’t believe in ghosts, but she refused to mess with ouija boards after an unsettling experience in her youth. I know that she felt that people would connect with the ideas in the Ghost Tamer. “People want an explanation, some comfort, about where their loved ones go.”

I’m honestly not sure what I believe, but I do believe that energy can neither be created nor destroyed, and Helga’s energy was fierce. I’m not sure where she went, but I refuse to believe that her essence is completely gone.

Yes, she will live on in the works she’s shaped. Yes, she will live on in the memories of her family and friends. And yes, she will live on as a voice in the head of every author she’s influenced and helped grow as they continue to work, but I think her reach will go farther than that.

It’s rare that you meet a person who continually makes you think, “I want to be more like that.” But I know for a fact that I have said out loud during at least one meeting, “I want to be like Helga when I grow up.” And so, I will not fall apart. Nothing is ever so screwed up that it cannot be fixed. And it’s not the end of the world. The world is different, and I will adapt. This has been a rough year and I have doubted every aspect of myself, including my writing, multiple times. But I’m going to do my best to remember Helga’s voice, not just while I’m writing, but also when I’m thinking about quitting. In her last text to me, she was still encouraging me. “All you need is one single yes. Just like with finding a publisher. Good luck!!!”

I still can’t believe that she’s gone, but knowing her made me want to be better. So better I shall become.