[2] Raised in Whitby, England, Walker did his national service with the Royal Air Force before working as an accountant and a property developer, among other jobs.
[4] Walker attended Whitby Grammar School, before performing national service with the Royal Air Force, where he was posted to India and Pakistan and learned accountancy.
[1][3] Walker moved to London and tried various careers, including accountancy, a short spell at ICI, running a club in Pimlico, being a waiter and bartender and a property developer, the lattermost after being gifted winnings his aunt made on a sweepstake.
Writing for The New York Times, William Grimes described Walker's horoscope columns as having "a literary sense and an urbane outlook on life rare for the genre".
[3] He has also been described as "the world's greatest astrologer"[1] and, by Justine Picardie writing for The Independent, as "the Henry James of horoscope writers [...] the man who'd made the trade respectable".
[1][10] Walker was active in the London social scene in the 1970s, wearing expensive clothes and jewellery and counting Elton John and The Beatles, whom he became acquainted with when they were beginning their careers in the early 1960s, as friends.
[1][5] He grew tired of partying and fame however, stating that it was "extremely hard to be perceived as someone who is always right [...] I was expected to be infallible, and it made me start drinking", and moved to Lindos on the Greek island of Rhodes in 1982 after falling in love with the village during a visit in 1979.