Gary Garrison has three children and six grandchildren, and has earned a Ph.D. in English from the University of Alberta. He was Editor of Alberta Hansard, coordinated a prison visitation program at Edmonton Institution (The Max), and is an active member of Edmonton’s literary community as a poet and nonfiction writer.

His previous nonfiction book, Human on the Inside: Unlocking the Truth about Canadian Prisons, was published in 2015.