Gary paulsen
AUTHOR STUDY
gearing up!
about the books of gary paulsen
The breadth of Gary Paulsen’s books alone—adventure, true stories, historical fiction, contemporary fiction, humor—make him the
perfect candidate for a classroom author study because there is truly a book for every student’s interest. On top of that, he’s a master
of the craft of writing—his vivid language can make your heart pound, it can make you think, it can make you laugh, it can make you
cry. Paulsen’s stories, told in a variety of voices and styles, often touch upon essential themes of survival, conservation, bravery,
self-discovery, and coming-of-age. He has led and continues to lead a fascinating life of adventure upon which he draws much of his
material from for his books.
about the author
Born May 17, 1939, Gary Paulsen is one of America's most
popular writers for young people. Although he was never a
dedicated student, Paulsen developed a passion for reading at an
early age. After a librarian gave him a book to read—along with
his own library card—he was hooked. He began spending hours
alone in the basement of his apartment building, reading one
book after another.
attack of angina and had to give up his dogs. “I started to focus
on writing [with] the same energies and efforts that I was using
with dogs. So we’re talking 18-, 19-, 20-hour days completely
committed to work. Totally, viciously, obsessively committed to
work, the way I’d run dogs. . . . I still work that way, completely,
all the time. I just work. I don’t drink, I don’t fool around, I’m
just this way. . . . The end result is there’s a lot of books out there.”
Running away from home at the age of 14 and traveling with a
carnival, Paulsen acquired a taste for adventure. A youthful
summer of rigorous chores on a farm; jobs as an engineer,
construction worker, ranch hand, truck driver, and sailor; and two
rounds of the 1,180-mile Alaskan dogsled race, the Iditarod, have
provided ample material from which he creates his powerful
stories.
Happily, Paulsen was later able to return to working with sled dogs
while continuing to write.
Paulsen’s realization that he would become a writer came
suddenly when he was working as a satellite technician for an
aerospace firm in California. One night he walked off the job,
never to return. He spent the next year in Hollywood as a
magazine proofreader, working on his own writing every night.
Then he left California and drove to northern Minnesota where
he rented a cabin on a lake; by the end of the winter, he had
completed his first novel.
Living in the remote Minnesota woods, Paulsen eventually turned
to the sport of dog racing, and entered the 1983 Iditarod. In 1985,
after running the Iditarod for the second time, he suffered an
It is Paulsen’s overwhelming belief in young people that drives
him to write. His intense desire to tap deeply into the human
spirit and to encourage readers to observe and care about the
world around them has brought him both enormous popularity
with young people and critical acclaim from the children’s book
community. Paulsen is a master storyteller who has written more
than 200 books and some 200 articles and short stories for
children and adults. He is one of the most important writers of
young adult literature today and three of his novels—Hatchet,
Dogsong, and The Winter Room—were Newbery Honor Books.
His books frequently appear on the best books lists of the
American Library Association.
Paulsen's wife, Ruth Wright Paulsen, is an artist who has
illustrated several of his books. He divides his time between his
dog kennel in Alaska, his ranch in New Mexico, and his sailboat
on the Pacific.
Visit www.garypaulsen.com for Paulsen’s Iditarod journal, top ten survival tips, and more!
Visit www.randomhouse.com/teachers for guides to using Paulsen’s books in the classroom.
Gary paulsen
AUTHOR STUDY
book list
ADVENTURE
❑ Canyons 
Grades 7 up
PB: 978-0-440-21023-8
❑ The Haymeadow 
Grades 5—9
PB: 978-0-440-40923-6
❑ The Time Hackers
Grades 4—7
PB: 978-0-553-48788-6
❑ The Transall Saga
Grades 5 up
PB: 978-0-440-21976-7
❑ The White Fox
Chronicles
Grades 5—9
PB: 978-0-440-41248-9
THE BRIAN BOOKS
❑ The River 
Grades 5—9
PB: 978-0-440-40753-9
PB: 978-0-440-22750-2
HC: 978-0-385-30388-0
❑ Brian’s Winter 
Grades 5 up
PB: 978-0-440-22719-9
HC: 978-0-385-32198-3
❑ Brian’s Return 
Grades 5 up
PB: 978-0-440-41379-0
HC: 978-0-385-32500-4
❑ Brian’s Hunt
Grades 5 up
PB: 978-0-553-49415-0
HC: 978-0-385-74647-2
TRUE ADVENTURE/
BIOGRAPHY
❑ Caught by the Sea
Grades 5 up
PB: 978-0-440-40716-4
HC: 978-0-385-32645-2
 = Available on audio from
❑ Guts
Grades 7 up
PB: 978-0-440-40712-6
❑ Father Water,
Mother Woods
with Ruth Wright Paulsen
All grades
PB: 978-0-440-21984-2
❑ How Angel
Peterson Got
His Name
Grades 5 up
PB: 978-0-440-22935-3
❑ My Life in Dog Years
Grades 5 up
PB: 978-0-440-41471-1
HC: 978-0-385-32570-7
GARY PAULSEN
WORLD OF
ADVENTURE SERIES
❑ Captive!
Grades 3—7
PB: 978-0-375-89510-4
❑ Danger on
Midnight River
Grades 3—7
PB: 978-0-440-41028-7
❑ Escape from
Fire Mountain
Grades 3—7
PB: 978-0-440-41025-6
COMING
OF AGE
❑ The Beet Fields
Grades 9 up
PB: 978-0-440-41557-2
❑ The Monument
Grades 5 up
PB: 978-0-440-40782-9
❑ The Night the
White Deer Died
THE TUCKET
ADVENTURES
Grades 7 up
PB: 978-0-440-21092-4
❑ Mr. Tucket
❑ Notes from
the Dog
Grades 7 up
HC: 978-0-385-73845-3
GLB: 978-0-385-90730-9
HISTORICAL
FICTION
❑ Alida’s Song
Grades 5 up
PB: 978-0-440-41474-2
❑ The Legend of
Bass Reeves
Grades 7 up
PB: 978-0-553-49429-7
HC: 978-0-385-74661-8
❑ The Quilt
Grades 3—7
PB: 978-0-440-22936-0
❑ Soldier’s Heart
Grades 7 up
PB: 978-0-440-22838-7
HC: 978-0-385-32498-4
❑ Woods Runner 
NEW!
Grades 7 up
HC: 978-0-385-73884-2
GLB: 978-0-385-90751-4
Companion books:
❑ Nightjohn
Grades 7 up
PB: 978-0-440-21936-1
HC: 978-0-385-30838-0
❑ Sarny
Grades 7 up
PB: 978-0-440-21973-6
Grades 5 up
PB: 978-0-440-41133-8
❑ Call Me Francis Tucket
Grades 5 up
PB: 978-0-440-41270-0
❑ Tucket’s Ride
Grades 5 up
PB: 978-0-440-41147-5
❑ Tucket’s Gold
Grades 4—7
PB: 978-0-440-41376-9
❑ Tucket’s Home
Grades 5 up
PB: 978-0-440-41558-9
❑ Tucket’s Travels
(Books 1—5)
Grades 5 up
PB: 978-0-440-41967-9
❑ Lawn Boy
Returns
Grades 4—7
HC: 978-0-385-74662-5
GLB 978-0-385-90899-3
Available May 2010
❑ Molly McGinty
Has a Really
Good Day
Grades 3—7
PB: 978-0-440-41482-7
❑ The Schernoff
Discoveries
Grades 5—9
PB: 978-0-440-41463-6
mystery
❑ Mudshark
Grades 3—7
PB: 978-0-553-49464-8
HC: 978-0-385-74685-4
GLB: 978-0-385-90922-8
humor
picture
books
❑ The Amazing Life
❑ Canoe Days
of Birds
Grades 5—9
PB: 978-0-553-49428-0
HC: 978-0-385-74660-1
❑ The Boy Who Owned
the School
Grades 4—7
PB: 978-0-440-40524-5
❑ The Glass Café
Grades 5 up
PB: 978-0-440-23843-0
❑ Lawn Boy
Grades 5 up
PB: 978-0-553-49465-5
HC: 978-0-385-74686-1
Illustrated by
Ruth Wright Paulsen
Grades PreK—3
PB: 978-0-440-41441-4
❑ Dogteam
Illustrated by
Ruth Wright Paulsen
Grades PreK—3
PB: 978-0-440-41130-7
Gary paulsen
AUTHOR STUDY
Looking at the author’s craft
the brian books
the tucket adventures
nightjohn and sarny
a word from gary paulsen
a word from gary paulsen
a word from gary paulsen
The River was a direct response to readers who sent
letters telling me that Brian’s story wasn’t done at
the end of Hatchet. So many wanted to know what
happened to Brian after the rescue that I started
wondering about him myself. What if Brian went
back to the woods with the knowledge he’d gained,
but this time he was also responsible for the life of
another person?
My initial inspiration for creating Mr. Tucket was to
cover the West with a single person. I hate to use
the word saga, but it’s kind of that. I thought of a
boy going through the various aspects of the West
when it was forming, starting with the mountain
men, to what we view as the West—you know, the
West of the cowboys.
I came into writing Nightjohn through the back
door. I worked for several years on research on a
book on Sally Hemings, who was a slave girl owned
by Thomas Jefferson. While I was doing the
research, I ran into many other stories, the slave
chronicles and its interviews of ex-slaves in the ’20s
and ’30s in America.
One of the reasons I think that Francis has become
popular is that I think there are similarities between
Francis Tucket and Brian in Hatchet. Both boys
must deal with a survival situation. I think that the
theme of having to face real problems that have
happened to real people at one time or another—
especially to face them as a young person—is very
intriguing to readers, especially young readers.
When I was young and I was hunting, I would get
into trouble—get caught in storms, blizzards, and
that sort of thing. I found those experiences very
challenging and intense and I think that feeling
comes across in the books.
I sat in my basement reading these things, crying
every night. And one of the things I ran into several
times was the slaves’ attempt to learn to read. For
the slaves it was a capital offense to learn to read
and they could be killed. These slaves usually
didn’t get killed right away because they were too
valuable to the slave owner. So the owners would
cut a thumb off, or sometimes a toe. These slaves
tried to teach each other to read and were
successful in many places. Most of the owners
were terrified of the slaves learning to read,
because they knew they would want to be free.
When I finished The River, I thought I’d taken his
story as far as it could go. And then the next batch
of letters started showing up. Again readers wrote
that there had to be more to the story, but this time,
they told me Brian had been rescued in Hatchet too
soon—“before it became really hard going.” What
would he have done, they wanted to know, if he
had to survive on his own through the winter?
Since my life has been one of survival in winter—
running two Iditarods, hunting and trapping as a
boy and young man—the challenge became
interesting, and so I researched and wrote Brian’s
Winter, showing what could and perhaps would
have happened had Brian not been rescued.
curriculum connections
• Gary Paulsen uses imagery to appeal to all of the
senses—sight, sound, smell, taste, and touch.
Allow students to browse the books and find
examples of such imagery. Ask them to use
Paulsen’s images to create similes.
• The vocabulary in Brian’s Winter is simple, but
Paulsen does extraordinary things with language.
Encourage students to notice his use of strong
verbs to convey difficult tasks, such as “hefted the
lance.” (p. 62) Ask them to locate other
examples of strong verbs in the book and to
use a thesaurus to identify appropriate word
substitutions.
curriculum connections
curriculum connections
• Read aloud the last two sentences in several
chapters (e.g., Tucket’s Ride, chapters 1, 5, and
9). Discuss why Gary Paulsen ends his chapters
on such cliff-hangers. Consider how the writer
keeps the reader reading. Ask students to find
other examples of cliff-hanger endings.
• In Call Me Francis Tucket, Gary Paulsen writes,
“Francis had changed almost daily.” (p. 91) Ask
your class to review the books and note the
changes Francis went through. Ask them to write
a short reflection on how Francis changed during
the adventures. Then give them time to share
and discuss their writings.
• Paulsen uses many images that portray the slaves
as being treated like animals. Have students make
a list of these images. Students can write a
“people analogy”—a description of a person that
uses the characteristics of a particular animal. For
example, Bill is a wily opponent who tricks his
football pursuers by retracing his steps. Other
students can guess the animal employed (fox).
• Because of the historical setting, words and
expressions that Paulsen uses in Nightjohn may
not be familiar to students. Students might use
the context of the story, or they can consult a
dictionary to determine the meaning of some
terms, such as “pallet,” “breeder,” and “crackers.”
Some students may be sensitive to the graphic
descriptions of slave life. Discuss how the words
made them feel and why they think Paulsen
chose to use these words in this book.
Random House Children’s Books | School and Library Marketing | 1745 Broadway, MD 10–4 | New York, NY 10019 | BN1005 • 12/09
Gary paulsen
AUTHOR STUDY
NAME:
response journal
Write your reaction to the Gary Paulsen book you are reading in the space below. What feelings,
thoughts, and questions come to your mind? Can you relate what you’ve read to something in your
own life, in another book, or in another venue? What can you infer about the author from what
you’ve read?
book:
chapter(s):
EDUCATORS: Reproduce this response journal for students.
www.garypaulsen.com
Gary paulsen
AUTHOR STUDY
NAME:
CHARACTER CHOICE BOARD
Gary Paulsen develops unique characters, and readers look forward to spending time with them.
Select one of the character-based activities below and apply it to one or more of Paulsen’s books.
Write diary entries from
the perspective of one the
characters over the course
of a story keeping in mind
their growth throughout the
adventure. (Brian or Francis
would be great candidates for
this activity because you
could look at multiple
books in the series.)
Become your favorite Paulsen
character! Learn everything
you can about the character
and the time period they
live in, dress like them,
and talk like you imagine
they sound. Have your
teacher or a classmate
interview you and record it
for your school’s Web site.
Draw a Venn diagram to
compare and contrast two
characters in the same
Paulsen book, two characters
in different Paulsen books, or
one character at different
points in a single book or
in a series. What common
threads do you notice in
Paulsen’s characters?
Pair up with a classmate and
choose two characters from
two different Paulsen books.
Begin a letter exchange from
the perspective of these
characters recording personal
thoughts, asking for/giving
advice, and commenting on
their time period.
Work with a group of four
classmates to choose a scene
in a Paulsen book where
characters have a dramatic
interaction or make revelations.
Rework this scene into a
Reader’s Theater script with a
part for each student in the
group. Rehearse together and
then act out the piece for
the rest of the class.
Create a chart that includes
each character in a Paulsen
book and lists their
personality traits, strengths
and weaknesses, and
relationships to the other
characters. Who are your
favorite and least favorite
characters? Why?
EDUCATORS: Reproduce this choice board for students.
www.garypaulsen.com
Gary paulsen
AUTHOR STUDY
NAME:
kwl chart
Fill in the first two columns before your class begins a Gary Paulsen Author Study. Fill in the third
column at the conclusion of the author study.
what I
know about
Gary paulsen
what I want
to know about
gary paulsen
what i
learned about
gary paulsen
EDUCATORS: Reproduce this KWL chart sheet for students.
www.garypaulsen.com