Ian Michael Wood was born in Manchester in 1964 and grew up in rural Cheshire. Between 1986 to 1994 he served in the British Army, serving in Northern Ireland and the Persian Gulf, after leaving the Army he has worked in the Corporate Security sector since 1995. He has authored and co-authored, along with Jeff Dugdale, several books on the German Panzerwaffe. He is currently married and resides in Reading, Berkshire.