Nancy Nye Hunt, after receiving her degree in agricultural education at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, worked as a legislative liaison for the governor, attorney general, and state legislature of Wisconsin. She then became a substitute teacher and volunteer in the elementary schools of Monona, Wisconsin, and worked as a specialist in children's literature at the renowned Pooh Corner Bookstore in Madison. The mother of two adult daughters, she lives and writes from her home, Prairie Trace Farm, in Wisconsin's Driftless area with her husband, Tom, an emeritus professor of restoration ecology.