Susan Compo grew up in Orange County, California, where she published the pioneering fanzine ? ¿ ? (subtitled ?The Fanzine for the Blank Generation?). She is the author of two story collections, Life After Death and Malingering, and the novel Pretty Things, as well as Warren Oates: A Wild Life and Earthbound: David Bowie and The Man Who Fell To Earth. She recently collaborated with artist Mark Wardel on the book David Bowie and 'Cracked Actor': The Fly in the Milk, and contributed to the monograph Derek Boshier: Reinventor (an essay on the artist's painting David Bowie and Teresa Cornelys). Shepard, her biography of the playwright and actor Sam Shepard, will be published in 2026.