The author was born in East Ham, London, in 1938. He has two sons and a daughter. In 1959 he became a fully qualified electrician after doing a five-year apprenticeship, after retiring in 2006, he moved to Spain a year later with his wife, Josephine. In 2018 Peter and his wife returned to England where they now live in Lavenham, Suffolk, with their daughter, Gemma.