Julio Mario Santo Domingo was born in Rio on October 20, 1957, the eldest son of Julio Santo Domingo, a Colombian businessman, and his Brazilian wife, Edyala Braga. Julio was raised in Colombia, moved to Brazil, then New York and finally Paris before he was nine. He studied law, then moved to New York to obtain a degree in comparative literature at Columbia University, the home of the Beats, whom he came to idolize. It was in New York that he met Vera Rechulski. They married in 1983. Peter Watts has been a journalist since he was 17. He has written for The Sunday Times, The Times, The Guardian, Observer, New Statesman, Daily Telegraph, Uncut, Time Out and many more. His first book was Up in Smoke: The Failed Dreams of Battersea Power Station, published by Paradise Road.