Ron Berry was born in 1920 in Blaen-cwm in the Rhondda Valley, and worked as a miner from the age of fourteen. His first published novel, Hunter and Hunted, appeared in 1960 and was followed by Travelling Loaded (1963), The Full-Time Amateur (1966), Flame and Slag (1968) and So Long, Hector Bebb (1970). He also wrote shorter fiction for television and radio. His last novel, This Bygone, was published in 1996. He died in 1997 and his Collected Stories and autobiography, History is What You Live, appeared posthumously in 1998.