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NICOLE PANTELEAKOS
Middle Grade Author & Playwright
Nicole Panteleakos is writer, thespian, and fanfiction enthusiast. Her debut novel, PLANET EARTH IS BLUE (Wendy Lamb Books, an imprint of Penguin Random House) was released on May 14, 2019, with a second middle grade novel to follow. She is represented by agent Katie Grimm at Don Congdon Associates and belongs to the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators: Metro NY. She was a 2018 & 2019 #PitchWars Mentor and a 2016 #PitchWars Mentee. She is working on her Children's Literature MFA thesis manuscript through Hollins University in Roanoke, VA and is also an available sensitivity & authenticity reader for middle grade and young adult novels (Autism/OCD/SPD/queer).
Planet Earth is Blue has earned 3 starred reviews (Kirkus, Booklist, School Library Journal), and is a 2020 Charlotte Huck Award Recommended Book, a Parents' Choice Foundation Gold Award winner, a Nerdy Book Club Award winner, and on the 'Best Middle Grade Books of 2019' lists as chosen by A Mighty Girl, the New York Public Library, the Denver Public Library, and Kirkus, plus a Washington Post KidsRead Summer Book Club selection (2019), a CT Governor's Reading List pick (2019), and on the Sunshine State Young Readers Award list (2020-2021), among other distinctions.
Nicole is a community theatre enthusiast, Youth Activities Ambassador of the VFW Auxiliary, and a member of the National Home for Children. She names her cats after authors - Shakespeare, Dickens, Beckett, (Mary) Shelley, and Poe - and, when not writing, can usually be found doing art projects with her godchildren, eating spicy chocolate, playing Animal Crossing, or adding to her Alice in Wonderland coffee cup collection.
