Graham Masterton was born in Edinburgh on 16 January 1946. After finishing his state education at the Whitgift school in Croydon, he worked for the Crawley Observer as a cub reporter and in 1967 applied to work for the Daily Telegraph, but was turned down. He then went to his uncle who worked on the Evening Standard, and was turned down again due to lack of experience. A day later his girlfriend suggested trying a new magazine called Mayfair. He applied and was hired. As it turned out, he ended up doing virtually everything: writing the headlines, copy editing, typography – training that resulted in him being able to write about anything at short notice. After three years he moved over to the UK edition of Penthouse. The publishers had just started an American edition, which led to Masterton visiting New York on a regular basis, getting to know the American publishers. With the support of those publishers he started writing sex instruction books. In 1975 Masterton turned to horror. His first novel was The Manitou, and he followed that success with a stream of further titles. In the ’80s he diversified into writing historical sagas, thrillers, even movie tie-ins. Nowadays, he regularly contributes creative and instructive articles to magazines, and short stories to international anthologies and is still writing novels.

William Seward Burroughs II (also known by his pen name William Lee; 5 February 1914-2 August 1997) was an American novelist, short story writer, essayist, painter and spoken word performer. A primary figure of the Beat Generation and a major postmodernist author, he is considered to be ‘one of the most politically trenchant, culturally influential, and innovative artists of the 20th Century’. His influence is considered to have affected a range of popular culture as well as literature. Burroughs wrote 18 novels and novellas, six collections of short stories and four collections of essays. Five books have been published of his interviews and correspondences. He also collaborated on projects and recordings with numerous performers and musicians, and made many appearances in films.