Alastair Reynolds was born in Barry, South Wales, in 1966 but spent his early years in Cornwall, before returning to Wales for his primary and secondary school education. He completed a degree in astronomy at Newcastle, then a PhD in the same subject at St Andrews in Scotland. He left the UK in 1991 and spent the next sixteen years working in the Netherlands, mostly for the European Space Agency, although he also did a stint as a postdoctoral worker in Utrecht. He returned to Wales in 2008 and now lives in the South Wales valleys, not too far from Cardiff.

Alastair Reynolds is married and likes horse riding, birds, long walks in the woods, good curries and old films

Taken from Alastair Reynolds' Website; for more information visit: http://www.alastairreynolds.com