The author was born in Transylvania, Romaniain 1971, as a member of the large Hungarian minority there. He grew up during Ceausescu’s dictatorship, having spent the first 18 years of his life in a society shaped by the Communist regime.

His home town, Marosvasarhely (or Tirgu Mures in Romanian) was the capital of Transylvaniain the middle ages, and despite the historic changes, it still has more than half of its population coming from Hungarian ethnic background. Also, it was among the first cities, where the 1989 Revolution swept through, before it crossed the Carpathian mountainsand ignited the capital.

After the Revolution, it was the scene of the pogrom organised by the Romanian extreme right, which targeted the Hungarian population, leading to days of bloodshed in which even the internationally renowned playwright, Andrew Suto lost one eye and was almost beaten to death. Having obtained his PhD in the UK, he stayed and worked there since, with regular visits to Romania.