Gary Paulsen

Jobs Before author

• Electronics Engineer
• Magazine Editor
• Contractor
• Sailor
• Musher

Jobs before Author

• Carney Worker
• Farmhand

Hobbies/likes

• Gary likes to compete in the Iditarod
• The Iditarod is a very long dog race
• If he was not an author, he would be a musher
• Or he would be a sailor
• Riding horses on his ranch and reading

Born and raised

• Born May 17, 1939
• Born in Minneapolis, Minnesota
• Grew up farming, engineering, editing, etc

Children

• He has 2 boys and a girl
• Surprisingly, they are not his inspiration
• He tells his kids, "Read like a wolf eats."
• He also tells them to write everyday

Motivation/inspiration

• Only 2 characters he writes about are real
• The rest are based off of real people
• He also writes about himself
• Ideas come to him when he least expects them
• The more he wrote, the more ideas he got

Fun and other facts

• Grew up with a bad home life
• His favorite authors are, Charles Dickens,
• Patrick O'Brien, Stephen Gould, and Carl Sagan
• Gary does not find one of his books better than another
• Good writing gives him chills and his neck hairs go up