John Darnielle

Born in Bloomington, Indiana, Darnielle grew up in Southern California with an abusive stepfather (as referenced frequently in The Sunset Tree). He attended Claremont High School (as referenced in Wolf in White Van and Black Sabbath's Master of Reality (33 1/3)). He lived in Portland, Oregon for a short time after high school, where he developed an addiction to intravenous methamphetamine and other hard drugs (as referenced in We Shall All Be Healed). Afterwards, he returned to California and went to work as a psychiatric nurse at the Metropolitan State Hospital in Norwalk, California. For a couple of years, he lived on the Metropolitan State grounds, writing songs and playing his guitar when he wasn't working. During this time he began recording some of his songs onto cassette tapes using a Panasonic boombox. Shortly after working at the hospital, Darnielle attended Pitzer College from 1991 to 1995, earning a degree in English.

Darnielle's first book, Black Sabbath: Master of Reality, was published in April 2008 as part of the 33⅓ series. He writes the "South Pole Dispatch" feature in Decibel Magazine every month. Darnielle also guest edited the poetry section of The Mays, an anthology of the best creative work coming out of Oxford and Cambridge.

Darnielle's first novel, entitled Wolf in White Van was released on September 16, 2014. On September 18, 2014, it was among ten books nominated for the National Book Award for Fiction.