Author turns almost-kidnapping into coming-of-age novel

Child abductions are terrifying and, fortunately, fairly rare in the United States.

That certainly wasn’t the case in Colombia when Ingrid Rojas Contreras was growing up, however.

Contreras told Weekend Edition that threatening phone calls detailing her and her sister’s daily routine would come through to their mother, though they didn’t know it at the time — and ultimately escaped that fate.

Contreras took that experience and used it as the basis for her debut novel, Fruit of the Drunken Tree.

Listen to her describe her childhood and how it influenced her future writing below, or read highlights on NPR’s website.