Tom Shepherd flew medical evacuation helicopters in Vietnam, where he received two Distinguished Flying Crosses, the Air Medal, and the Purple Heart. He has worked as a Japanese linguist, public school teacher, and graduate school instructor. Shepherd is originally from Reading, Pennsylvania, but lived in Alaska, Germany, Indochina, and the Republic of Korea. He spent the balance of of his professional career working with churches in the Deep South, California, and the Midwest and serving as Professor of Religious Studies at Unity Institute near Kansas City, Missouri. Author of a wide array of articles and nonfiction books, plus more than twenty plays and two novels for the middle grades, Dr. Shepherd "retired" in 2016 to write novels full time.

Star Lawyers is his sci-fi series. ("Arrested on an alien world, who you gonna call?") Tom Shepherd lives with his wife Carol-Jean in Tucson, Arizona.