John Gilmore was born and raised in Hollywood and has worked as a child actor, a stage and motion picture player, poet, screenwriter, low-budget film director, journalist, true-crime writer and novelist. He has headed the writing program at Antioch University and has taught and lectured extensively. He is the author of Severed: The True Story of the Black Dahlia Murder, Manson, and his first book of memoirs, Laid Bare.