Frequently asked questions, and answers from Jeanette Ingold

• What are some of the books you’ve written?

THE WINDOW, MOUNTAIN SOLO, HITCH, THE BIG BURN.

• How long have you been writing?

Most of my life, beginning with diaries and journals. Professionally—since my twenties, when I first took a job on a newspaper. My first novel came out in 1996.

• Where do you get your ideas?

I find my stories exploring whatever I’m curious about, which is just about anything I come across that’s new to me.

• What are your favorite things to write about?

I like writing about wilderness adventures, about interesting historical events and periods, about the jobs that people do. And my characters and the relationships among them are always at the heart of my books.

• What’s your new book? And what’s it about?

PAPER DAUGHTER. It’s about a girl who takes a summer job on a newspaper, with no idea that the first story she works on will plunge her into a race to uncover secrets that she’d thought she could ignore. It’s about journalism, identity, family, immigration from China during the Exclusion era.

• Do any of your books come from your own life? Or from your family?

Bits and pieces do. My son, who's fought wildfire for the Forest Service, helped me get the details of THE BIG BURN right. AIRFIELD started with my dad's stories about his early days with the airlines. I played violin while in school, and I put what I loved about orchestra practice into MOUNTAIN SOLO. The voices of elderly Texas relatives are in PICTURES, 1918.

• What do you like to read?

Lots of things. I usually have four or five books going at once, scattered throughout the house. I like exciting new fiction, historical stories, mysteries, adventures, thrillers, humor. And I read a lot of non-fiction--psychology, history, memoirs, computer and technology books, journals and newspapers.

• What do you like to do? Do you have hobbies?

I like cameras, computer stuff, hiking and camping, watching wildlife, playing with my dog (she's a Lab-Aussie mix), genealogy, reading, road trips, getting together with other book people, experimenting with my writing craft, 1930s movies, ghost towns, and old buildings that promise secrets.

• Do you write short stories?

Sometimes. Moving On, about a Dallas girl in the early 1900s, is in TIME CAPSULE: SHORT STORIES ABOUT TEENAGERS THROUGHOUT THE TWENTIETH CENTURY, an anthology edited by Don Gallo. Word Drift is in XANADU 3, an anthology edited by Jane Yolen.

• What have you written for young children?

My first published fiction were the stories Saturday, Smaterday and The Stuff in Bevin’s Room, both of which appeared in Children’s Digest magazine.

• Where are you from?

I grew up in New York, I'm a Montanan now, and in between I've lived in Delaware, Kansas, Texas, and Washington State.