To contact me, use christina.d.vojta at gmail.com.

I grew up in the Pacific Northwest, in a family that loved hiking and backpacking. After graduating from the University of Washington, I lived in Yosemite National Park for ten years with my husband Mead Hargis, where we both worked for the National Park Service. I have journals from those days that describe three years of living in the backcountry—Little Yosemite Valley in the summer and Tuolumne Meadows in the winter. Eventually, we both left the mountains to pursue degrees, and I earned a Masters in Wildland Science at U.C. Berkeley with a thesis on American martens.

Mead continued to work in Yosemite National Park while I drifted downslope to the Inyo National Forest and worked as the District Biologist for the Mono Lake Ranger District for ten years. During that time, I carried out research on home range and habitat use of northern goshawks, and that is also when our two children were born.

I earned my Ph.D. at Utah State University, where I investigated the effects of landscape pattern on American marten. I also contributed to our understanding of landscape pattern metrics and how they perform under different landscape mosaics. After graduation, I accepted the position of Assistant National Wildlife Ecologist for the Forest Service. Although the position was directly linked to the Washington, D.C. headquarters, I lived in Flagstaff, Arizona during the ten years that I held that post. After retiring from the Forest Service, I was the Science Coordinator for the Desert Landscape Conservation Cooperative, and subsequent to that, the Assistant Director for the Landscape Conservation Initiative at Northern Arizona University.

I finally decided to shed the responsibilities of office work so that I would be free to pursue my love of creative writing. I travelled to Peru to assist with a research study of monkey behavior with respect to their principal predator, the harpy eagle. My month in the Amazon rainforest triggered ideas for a novel, and Shadows in the Selva was born. I returned to Peru three more times to obtain research for that novel, and I made many friends who assisted me in creating a story that accurately portrays the ecology and culture of that area.

I’ve also written several essays that draw from my knowledge of ecology and my experiences living and working in the outdoors. To my delight, two of these essays were published almost immediately, and two more are scheduled for publication in 2020. Please see the link to Essays for access to these pieces.

I have begun to work on a second novel that chronicles the misadventures of an escaped convict who is hiding out on the Pacific Crest Trail. Stayed tuned!

I live with my husband, Scott Vojta, in a house tucked away among the pinyon pines near Flagstaff, Arizona. In addition to creative writing, I love to hike, backpack, play the guitar and hammered dulcimer, birdwatch, and spend time with Scott, my children and grandchildren.