Cipriano Moio was born in the 93rd arrondissement of Saint-Denis. The son of Italian immigrants, the youngest of five children, he spent his entire youth in Eaubonne, a suburban housing project north of Paris. He owes much of the happy days of his childhood to this orchard nestled between the walls of the buildings, a corner of paradise that remained wild and was, for him, the most beautiful of playgrounds. Despite his passion for reading novels, which he devoured without restraint in his spare time, school would not be the place of fulfillment he had hoped for. He felt as cramped there as a lion in a cage. He was a rebellious dreamer who spent most of his time watching the birds fly behind the windows of his classroom. After a short period of study, with his BEPC (French vocational certificate) in his pocket, he left school at the age of 17 to work for a few months in two metalworking factories, which would definitively dissuade him from following in his father's footsteps as a worker at Citroën. He did his military service in Alsace, a year that would leave him with lasting nightmares, then ran a pizza truck for 12 years. Dissatisfied, thirsting for wide open spaces and freedom, and desperately in love with the French language, he left his suburbs and his job as a pizza maker at the age of 33 to move to the countryside, where he has since devoted himself entirely to writing.