Karen is the author of eleven books, four novellas and has edited/rewrote two memoirs.
Souls and Shadows is a young adult (12 years and up) fantasy series—the first two published and more books to follow. Although this series bears some resemblance to Harry Potter, the plotline is more complex as the heroine must not only learn magic but how to make friends in a new school and get over her self-consciousness. (She is 6 ft 4 and doesn’t consider herself athletic.)
By the Horse’s Wings is an “epic fantasy” series consisting of four books written for young people from 17 years up. (Or what the industry refers to as “new adults.”) For animal lovers, these books are the ultimate fantasy—a dragon and horse that can fly!
The Amorphan Effect is a “space opera” series for young adults featuring a young woman who travels to a distant planet as a “foreign” exchange student. And Dr. Trouble is a humorous science-fiction novella.
All of these books are available on Amazon. To better allow the Amazon algorithms to distinguish between the various genres, Karen writes under both her own name and several pen names- K.E. Brungardt, Karen Kanouse and Kara Ellison.
Karen also edited both her mother’s memoir (growing up in a Brooklyn orphanage) and her father’s memories of his Merchant Marine days during World War II.
Although all the books Karen has authored are fictional, the Dr. Trouble novella draws on Karen’s experience as an osteopathic physician. Although, unlike the heroine, who travels to other worlds to attend to alien life forms, Dr. Karen only worked on human patients!
Karen’s father was a physician but, while now it seems natural that she followed in his footsteps, this was not an expected path for a young woman when she graduated from college in 1974. In addition, her undergraduate degree was not in the sciences but was in the fine arts! Thus, she took a job as an insurance adjuster before applying to medical school. While the insurance business was not her chosen career path, her job had one major benefit, as it led her to the love of her life, Larry Brungardt. They were married in 1977. Sadly, he suffered lifelong medical problems, after undergoing brain surgery in the 1980’s. He passed away earlier this year.
In 1985, Karen graduated from a Kansas City medical school with a degree in osteopathic medicine. (This medical training qualifies osteopathic physicians to undertake the same tasks as medical physicians but in addition trains them to engage in “manipulative therapy” such as used by chiropractors. Karen and Larry then moved to Wyoming where she went into private practice with a partner. In this rural area she was treating patients “womb to tomb”—working in the emergency room, in nursing homes and seeing private patients for all medical needs, including obstetrics and pediatrics.
In 1997, the couple were at loose ends for Christmas and decided to take a short vacation. Larry had discovered the SaddleBrooke “preferred guest program” that provided two nights lodging with a tour of available properties; and so, the couple braved a blizzard to drive from Wyoming to SaddleBrooke.
Karen was forced to give up her practice in 2001 as serious back problems limited her mobility and strength. (Karen explains that doctoring is more physical than one might expect, as you have to “meet the patient where he or she is at”.)
Larry had grown tired of Wyoming winters and urged Karen to consider retirement in a warmer climate. He researched numerous options, but Karen was dead set on coming back to SaddleBrooke. The couple bought a lot here in 2002 and moved in after their home was built.
Karen started writing books after retirement but soon discovered that self-publishing on Amazon was better for her than submitting her works to publishing houses. Along the way, she also discovered that there were numerous skills to be mastered- such as marketing and publicity, formatting and the design of book covers. For example, she explains, clarity is better than complexity in the choice of a book cover. The Amazon viewer may be rapidly clicking on book covers and needs to be able to discern the genre quickly- a spaceship for science fiction, a horse with wings for fantasy, a young girl in a school uniform signifies a young adult novel. Karen was able to teach herself many of these skills by using the websites selfpublishing.com. Her book covers were created by 1000covers.com.
Karen has set a goal of writing two thousand words per day. She fills the rest of her time caring and enjoying her cockapoo rescue dog, playing American Standard Bridge and developing her artistic skills as a watercolorist. She teaches watercolor classes (which are advertised in this newspaper) and exhibits her paintings at various art shows and in the hallway outside the Roadrunner Grille in the SaddleBrooke HOA-1 Clubhouse. If she has a vitamin that gives her such phenomenal energy, she should start marketing it!
