Richard grew up with the threat of mutually assured destruction, and public information films haunted by the robed Spirit of Dark and Lonely Water. His earliest reading included folk tales about plucky country folk fooling the Devil, alongside the heroes and creatures of Greek and Norse myth. In time he discovered the works of Stephen King, Clive Barker, and H.P. Lovecraft.

In his early teens Richard started storytelling, including scripting a zombie movie one summer in which the local kids all had parts. Much of his effort went into running roleplaying games, and eventually he started writing short stories too.

Currently, Richard is working at the University of Glasgow, managing multi-million research projects and continues to write. He is married, with two cats.