Eleni Karelis is a writer and a researcher originally from the hills of Southeastern Kentucky. She holds a BA from the University of Kentucky where she studied English with a minor in Appalachian Studies. Her undergraduate thesis, Appalachian Adolescence, is a chapbook of Appalachian poetry documenting the transition to adulthood and away from the Appalachian region. 

She received her MA in Creative Writing from the University of Westminster in London, England where she researched 14th century English piracy on the Thames. Her master’s dissertation, The Amulet of Antioch, explores themes of gender, labor, sexuality, crime, and culture of Chaucerian London.