Czajkowski was born in Woodhall Spa, Lincolnshire. He now lives in Leeds with his wife Annie and son Alex. He is represented by Simon Kavanagh from the Mic Cheetham agency. After fifteen years of trying to get published Czajkowski obtained his first break in 2008. That year Empire in Black and Gold was published by Tor (UK) - an imprint of Pan Macmillan - in the United Kingdom. The series was later picked up for publication in America by Pyr Books. He has stated in his blog, that he chose to publish under the pseudonym Tchaikovsky, as his given name could have caused potential difficulties for American and British readers in both spelling and pronunciation. This is a common marketing approach in both UK and US publishing industries, where the publishers feel a name should be altered to help sales. Subsequently the American and German editions of the book and its sequels were published under the same pseudonym. Czajkowski expressed desire that the Polish editions of his novels be printed under his real name, but these too used his pseudonym.