This interview originally appeared in the January/February 2021 Horn Book Magazine as part of the Publishers’ Previews: Middle-Grade, an advertising supplement that allows participating publishers a chance to each highlight a book from its current list. They choose the books; we ask the questions.

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Gone to the Woods: Surviving a Lost Childhood is a memoir in all but name, as Paulsen revisits his difficult — and filled with some unlikely work experiences — youth.

1. I thought the geese were bad, but then sharks?

I seem prone to being in the wrong place at the wrong time, as with the sharks. And triggering the attack response of geese…and moose…and bears…and mosquitoes…and a mother cat under the porch of my mountain shack, although, to be fair, we have a lot of rattlers and she had a new litter, so I can’t blame her for launching a preemptive strike.

2. What’s it like knowing that some book you wrote surely did for some kid what “Green Hope” did for your hero?

Extremely humbling. I just made friends with a doctor on the front lines of COVID; his mother got in touch with me when he caught it and asked if I would write to him because he had read my stuff as a kid, and it would mean something to him to hear from me as he was battling this virus. Another time, a while back, a kid had gotten lost on a camping trip and was missing for a few days. A reporter asked the dad how he could stay so calm, and the guy — he was so cool — said, “We’ve read Gary Paulsen’s outdoor survival books together; he’ll be okay until we can find him.” That was a great moment for me, when the boy was found safe.

3. What transferable skills did you acquire as a bowling-alley pinsetter?

I move like greased lightning, with the reflexes of a Condylostylus fly, which has come in handy. And I can pick up three bowling pins in each hand, which, I am the first to admit, has limited use in day-to-day life.

4. Do you feel like you have a home yet?

Anytime I’m on the ocean, or in a forest, next to a dog, or reading or writing a book, I’m home. I am — I know — a very lucky man.

5. Can you fix my television?

Yes, if it was manufactured before 1967 and has a high voltage flyback network. Otherwise, have you tried unplugging it and then plugging it back in? I might also suggest new batteries for the remote, but that’s only because I’m a trained professional.

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Photo: Brian Adams.