Guido Mina di Sospiro was born in Buenos Aires into an ancient aristrocratic Italian family, but raised in Milan from when he was three months old. A protege of the late Hungarian composer Miklos Rozsa, upon his urging he moved to Los Angeles, and attended the Cinema Production Department at the University of Southern California.

He was later married in New York, and eventually moved to Florida. There, in his hurricane-tested, soundproof studio, shaded by live oaks, enveloped by creeping fig, and visited by squirrels, opossums, racoons, foxes, etc., he has written the story of the English yew by setting it entirely in his beloved Ireland. He still lives in Miami with his wife and three sons, and with them migrates anually to Europe.