John Moss was born in Waterloo County, Ontario, in 1940. He swam the Hellespont in 1962 and has since travelled widely, especially in the Arctic; he has received awards in a variety of marathon sports. His books, which range from memoir to meditation, poetry to poetics, include Enduring Dreams: An Exploration of Arctic Landscape and the encyclopedic study A Reader’s Guide to the Canadian Novel. He lives with his wife Beverly in Peterborough, Ontario.