 |
Karen Abbott was born and raised in Philadelphia. She attended sixteen years of Catholic school, a tenure that gave her a freakishly photographic memory, a tendency toward rebellion, and a finely tuned sense of guilt.
She worked as a journalist in Philadelphia for several years, burned out, and moved to Atlanta to pursue writing book-length narrative nonfiction. A search for an ancestor who went missing in 1905 led her to write her New York Times bestseller Sin in the Second City, which tells the true story of two sisters who ran the world’s most famous brothel and the nationwide battle to shut them down. Her interest in Gypsy Rose Lee stems from stories her grandmother shared about the ecdysiast’s performances in the 1930s and 40s. (Her grandmother insists said stories are second-hand, but that’s up for debate.) |
She now lives in New York City with her husband and two African Grey parrots who do mean Ethel Merman impressions, and is at work on her next book.
Buy the Books
Follow Karen Abbott!
