Rafael Derchansky was born in a small village in Siberia in 1954, 14 years after Stalin forcefully deported his parents from Lithuania. In 1960, he and his family moved  to the city Tomsk, one of the oldest towns in Siberia. In 1970, he finished high school and enrolled in Tomsk Polytechnic University.

 

In 1973, the USSR temporarily lifted the Iron Curtain to allow some of its citizens to leave the country. Rafael and his family used this opportunity to immigrate to Israel. There he completed his studies and met his wife while working in the hi-tech sector and serving in the country's Air Force.

 

Seeking new horizons, he immigrated to Canada in 1988, where he currently resides with his wife and two sons. When he is not writing his latest novel, he can be found painting or navigating the Great Lakes with his boat.