Media & Public Speaking

Press Contact:

Jessica Napp

212-698-4665

UK Media
Nigel Stoneman
44(0)20-7316-1977

Available for download:

• Author photo (photo by David Drapkin)
• The Ivy Chronicles (high resolution)
• The Ivy Chronicles (low resolution)

• Karen speaks about The Ivy Chronicles on The Daily Buzz
• Karen Quinn was featured on The View! Watch the video here
• Watch The Ivy Chronicles as featured on The Richard and Judy Show
• Watch Karen Quinn’s appearance on 20/20 here!
• Watch Karen on CBS 2 News at Noon
• New York City school admissions is funny business!
See The Daily Show’s take on the subject here

*These videos are in WMV format and require Windows Media Player. If you do not have Windows Media Player installed, get it here.

Karen Quinn has been featured in...

1. The Ivy Chronicles is about a woman who loses her big corporate job and then reinvents herself into a school admissions advisor helping rich Manhattanites get their kids into private school. Isn’t that what happened to you? Is this a thinly disguised tell-all?

2. In the book, desperate parents do outrageous things to get their children accepted into schools. What are some of the craziest things you've seen people do to get their kids into school?

3. Is the admissions scene this competitive in cities other than Manhattan?

4. Why are parents are willing to go to such extremes for a place in nursery school?

5. How do children react to their parent’s anxieties about getting them into a hot school?

6. One of the fun parts of the book was seeing how the super wealthy live. Were your clients typically that rich?

7. There’s a great scene in the book where a character pays $35,000 for a dinner date with George Clooney at a private school auction. How realistic is that?

8. What is the downside of going to an elite private school?

9. Did you work with any famous clients?

10. The Ivy Chronicles is in development as a Warner Bros. film, with Catherine Zeta-Jones attached to play Ivy. Who else do you hope they cast?

11. What's more challenging, working in nursery school admissions or corporate America?

12. When you started your business, did you do so with the intention of writing about it? How did you find a publisher?

• Reinventing Yourself – How to Make Your Dream Life Real

• Confessions from the Fast Lane

• The 10 Laws of Reinvention

• Testimonials

• More about Karen Quinn

You Think Getting Into Harvard is Tough – The Crazy Things Parents Will Do to Get Their Kids into the Right Pre-Schools!

A securities lawyer for brokerage firms, an advertising executive for American Express, a kindergarten admissions consultant for New York City’s wealthiest families, and now an author with a movie deal, Karen Quinn had a few false starts before figuring out what she wanted to be when she grew up.

In 2000, Karen was downsized from an executive job at American Express after fifteen years. Her ego shattered, she had no idea what to do next. So, she went to the bookstore looking for inspiration in the business section. There, she found an Entrepreneur’s Handbook that said “if you can think of something people hate doing, and you can make it better for them, there’s a business.” Karen immediately focused on the nightmare she had recently survived – getting her children into private school in Manhattan – a blood sport on the best of days. With no experience, she started Smart City Kids, a company devoted to helping New York parents get their children into the best private nursery schools, kindergartens, and public schools. Her services were in great demand and she soon appeared on 20/20, in the New York Times and Forbes Magazine as an expert in school admissions. Then one day, a client in Pull-ups insisted that Karen stop making her cram for her kindergarten admissions test. “Can’t you see I’m only four?” The child implored. Karen quit the business soon after.

Unemployed again, Ms. Quinn decided to try to write that novel she had always secretly dreamed about. There was just one problem. She had no experience writing anything besides the annual holiday letter. Karen decided that if she didn’t try to make her fantasy come true now, she probably never would, so she went for it. In three months, she had the first draft of The Ivy Chronicles. It is the story of Ivy Ames, a woman who loses her job, her husband, and her fabulous uptown lifestyle. To get back on her feet and support her two daughters, she decides to become an advisor to rich Manhattanites, helping their little darlings get into the crème de la crème of private school. It is a hilarious and heartbreaking story of how Ivy picks herself up after bitter loss, dusts herself off, and creates a new and better life. Like Ivy, Karen Quinn lost her job, her home (but not her husband – whew!) and was forced to start over and reinvent herself, which she did by first starting a school admissions business and then by writing The Ivy Chronicles.

After completing her manuscript, Karen’s road to getting published was serendipitous. Her babysitter knew an agent, and even though the agent wasn't taking new clients, she fell in love with the book and took it on. Soon after, the woman sitting next to Karen at the World Track and Field Championships in Paris, France turned out to be the editor of The Devil Wears Prada. Karen’s husband gave the editor the manuscript. She loved it and wanted to publish it, starting a bidding war between four major publishers. Soon there was a two-book international deal and a movie sale to Warner Brothers with Catherine Zeta Jones set to play Ivy. It’s the stuff dreams are made of.

At the podium, Karen will have you laughing out loud when she describes the craziness she witnessed advising rich and powerful Uptown warriors who would stop at nothing to have their well-heeled spawn land a coveted spot at the city’s fanciest schools. You will be inspired by Karen’s own story as she shares insights about reinvention and her belief that now, more than ever, we must all learn how to find new identities for ourselves as we experience the inevitable changes life delivers. She reveals what she learned when creating her own new life and offers practical advice on how you can turn own dreams into reality.

Ms. Quinn grew up in San Antonio and Austin, Texas. Then she moved to Colorado where she lived for several years before landing in Manhattan. She and her husband have two children. She recently sold her second novel, Wife in the Fast Lane, and completed her third, India Fudge and the Time Travel Tunnel.