Phil Masters has a degree in Economics from Cambridge University and spent a few years as a computer programmer before somehow becoming a full-time author and occasional editor, specialising in roleplaying games material. This means that he has worked in genres ranging from historical fantasy through superheroes to science fiction, and been allowed to play in a lot of other writers' worlds. Over the last thirty years or so, along with a number of magazine articles, he has written or contributed to numerous books for companies including Hero Games (for whom he created Kingdom of Champions), White Wolf (The Artisan's Handbook and The Swashbuckler's Handbook), Atlas Games (Faerie Stories), and Steve Jackson Games (GURPS Arabian Nights, GURPS Places of Mystery, GURPS Atlantis, GURPS Dragons, GURPS Banestorm, and - with Terry Pratchett - The Discworld Roleplaying Game). He is currently line editor for the Transhuman Space hard SF roleplaying setting from the latter company. He is married, and lives and works in Hertfordshire.

This book retells the story of Sinbad the Sailor and recounts tales of the voyages on which he acquired his wealth, of the strange peoples and monsters he encountered along the way and of lands beyond the horizon. It places the fiction of Sinbad, popularised in the collection of stories known as the Arabian Nights, into the context of medieval Cairo where these tales were originally told. By retracing the history of these stories and the Arabian voyages of exploration and trade which inspired them, and by examining modern incarnations of Sinbad that have appeared since his stories reached the West, this book breathes new life into these ancient tales of adventure, magic and mystery.