Jilted Bride Gets Ultimate Revenge: Quits Job, Travels the World
Collins in Asia. (Photo: @notwedordead/Instagram)
Is there any better way to get over being left at the alter than turning your whole life into one big honeymoon?
That’s exactly what 30-year-old Brit Katy Collins did when her ex suddenly called off their wedding a month before they were supposed to tie the knot. Devastated, Collins promptly sold everything she owned (her house, her car — basically anything that wouldn’t fit into a backpack), quit her PR job, and bought a one-way ticket to southeast Asia.
“Everyone did think I was a little mad, especially as I’d never travelled anywhere by myself before, but it just felt right,” she told Manchester Evening News. "I needed the time away from everything and everyone."
At first, despite seeing amazing sights from the Taj Mahal to the Himalays, Collins was having a rough time. "I was still working through the feelings that I wouldn’t be making wedding scrapbooks or be living the married life - well not just yet at least,” she said. But then she had an epiphany: "I began to think ‘what if you were given a second chance to find yourself?’”
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On Bolivian salt flats. (Photo: @notwedordead/Instagram)
Collins certainly did find herself, traveling for four years to places like Nepal, India, Dubai, Brazil, Argentina, and eventually moving to France. That’s when she landed a book deal. Collins started the blog NotWedorDead.com to update her friends and family on her travels and adventures, and it soon took off with a wider audience. That’s what inspired Carina, an imprint of Harper Collins, to give the traveler a three-book deal. Her first tome, The Lonely Hearts Travel Club, Destination: Thailand comes out digitally on Jan. 21.
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