Jay was born in Lerwick on the edge of the arctic circle, and read Italian at UCL London and Bologna University. He emigrated to Australia for some sunshine (via Iran and New Zealand) at the turn of the century. No one had told him it rains more in Nimbin than it does in England. Software technical writing earns a crust, when he's not blogging, dabbling in hard SciFi with the local writers group, or composing the crossword for the local paper. He lives on a hobby farm with his wife, two kids, native beehives, a lazy dog, a decreasing number of chickens, and an increasingly large python. He tweets (frequently) at @jaystephens