Katie Karambelas

The short & sweet version:

Katie Karambelas is an author and mother of three residing in outside Raleigh, NC. While her day job has her strategically planning clinical trial proposals, Katie completed her MFA in fiction in 2017 at Cedar Crest College and is represented by Amy Brewer at Metamorphosis Literary Agency. Her debut new adult novel SECOND BEST was published by Champagne Books on 03 August 2020.  You can find Katie’s words on websites such as The Huffington Post, Elite Daily, Thought Catalog, Motherly, and Matador Network, as well as in numerous literary magazines. Keep up with Katie’s adventures as she strives to become a better mom with each adventure life throws her way on her blog called The Jet-Setting Mama where she writes about travel and parenting. You can purchase Second Best on Amazon and B&N.

The longer version:

Katie Karambelas grew up as a military brat, where her love of travel first began. By the time she was in fourth grade, she’d been to five different schools and knew how to make friends quickly. Her family settled in North Carolina when she was in fourth grade and she was happy to finally put down roots. If you ask her today, she will insist she’s a southern girl – and her accent will convince you!

Katie danced from the young age of four earned a minor in Dance at UNCG. When she was in middle school, her love affair with acting began and she auditioned for her first musical, Little Shop of Horrors. Since LSoH, Katie has starred and appeared in many theatre, film, television, and commercial projects throughout NC, including national ad campaigns and SAG feature films. Her love of film and television continued on through college at UNCG where she earned her BA in media studies with a concentration in media writing (particularly, screenwriting). Her final project was a feature-length screenplay entitled “Songbird” that the story of a couple falling in love during the Vietnam war era.

In sixth grade, Katie’s language arts teacher, Miss Hanly, let her write a short story for extra credit. Katie was always a bit of an overachiever. This extra credit project was where Katie’s love affair with words truly began. Miss Hanly entered her story in a contest where she won honorable mention. While Katie didn’t have to take any writing classes beyond what was required (newswriting and screenwriting) for her major, Katie also picked up several creative writing fiction classes, inspiring her to start her first YA novel. She was lucky enough to study under some of UNCG’s creative writing MFA program instructors and students while in these classes, most notable Stephanie Wilson, and was thankful for their help molding her writing and pushing her to be the best she could possibly be.

Katie had her son in 2012 and a year later, while still tirelessly working on her YA novel and working full time, she left her husband and moved back to Raleigh. After her divorce, and writing the first draft of her NA novel, she was determined to do something she always said she would do: get her masters in writing. Katie applied to four schools: Cedar Crest College, Lesley University, Seton Hill, and Fairleigh Dickinson. After receiving offers from every school, she chose to start the Fall 2014 semester at Cedar Crest College’s Pan-European MFA program in fiction. The program combined her love of writing and travel letting her visit Vienna, Dublin, and Barcelona. It also introduced her to life-long friends and colleagues (aka cheerleaders – these men and women are forever on her team and she theirs) and in July 2017 while 6 months pregnant with her daughter, she graduated from the program in Barcelona, Spain. She had her daughter just a couple months later in September 2017.

In 2016, Katie ventured into the online world of writing where she started a blog called “Writing and Wanderlust” that soon changed to “The Jet-Setting Mama” which focuses on parenting, travel, and lifestyle topics. Her social media skills have proved invaluable to her blog’s success and she’s worked with many brands such as Baby+Co, Thomas the Train, The Stork, Lillebaby, Boppy, Forte Elements, and City Discovery. She also uses her experience from working for a brick & mortar travel agency after college as well as her own travels to book travel for friends and family to destinations in the Caribbean and Europe.

In September 2018, Katie signed with Amy Brewer of Metamorphosis Literary Agency. In April 2019, she finally married her husband in Florence, Italy after a 3-year engagement. Katie sold her first novel, Second Best, to Champagne Books in September 2019. Second Best was published in August 2020. A month later, Katie had her third child, a girl, in September 2020.

For her day job, Katie works for a clinical trial company. She spends her free time with her husband, kids, and dog Corona (yes, it’s a tradition to name the dogs after beer). When not exploring the world, you can often find her with a book in one hand, and prosecco in the other.

Projects: Katie currently has a 76,000 word young adult contemporary novel in the process of editing prior to submission to editors. In addition, she is working on three YA novels she hopes to finish soon, one in particular that she’s very excited about.