Zelas, Karen

Karen Zelas is a former psychiatrist and psychotherapist. Her poetry has appeared in Blackmail Press, bravado, Broadsheet, Catalyst, Eclectism (Australia), Eucalypt (Australia), JAAM, Kokako, Landfall, Pasture, Poetry NZ, Presto, Rabbit (Australia), Snorkel (Australia), takahē, The Press, and blogged by International Literary Quarterly. Her work has been anthologised in New Zealand and Australia, most recently in Essential New Zealand Poems (Random House, 2014), reclaiming the sky (NZ Poetry Society, 2014) and pending in the 2015 NZPS anthology.

Karen was shortlisted in the Kathleen Grattan Award 2013, won the Poems4Peace competition (Printable Reality) in 2014 and was HC in the 2015 Caselberg Award. Her first book of poetry, Night’s Glass Table, was selected as the 2012 IP Picks Best First Book by Interactive Publications, Brisbane, who also republished her novel Past Perfect (Wily, 2010). In 2014, Karen published her second book of poetry, feathers unfettered: 25 NZ Birds. She is currently working on a book-length verse biography, working title The Hanging of Minnie Dean.

Karen won the 2013 Playwrights Assn of NZ Playwriting Competition for her script Poverty and Muse. Her biographical verse play Geography of Loss was staged in Christchurch in 2014.

Karen has been fiction editor of takahē for 9 years, editing 26 issues of the magazine.

She has recently started the small indie publishing house, Pukeko Publications, with the publication of Aspiring Light by Robynanne Milford. Information about Pukeko Publications can be found on the website: www.KarenZelas.com