Michael Alexander was educated at Stowe, Sandhurst and Colditz. He has travelled extensively and adventurously in Asia and the Americas, locating 12c Firuzkoh in central Afghanistan and describing the lost minaret of Jham. He was the first person to circumnavigate the north of Scotland in a 4 metre rigid inflatable, and has travelled to the source of the Ganges and through the Great Himalayan George in a small hovercrafts. He has written a screenplay for Vladimir Nabokov's Ada which he is also producing. He is interested in natural history and was a director of Wildlife Magazine and founder of the Woburn Safari Service. The author of a number of highly acclaimed historical studies, he lives in London.