AustLit

Nell Van De Graaff was born in Menado, Sulawesi, Indonesia, of Dutch parents. She gained her schooling to matriculation standard in the Netherlands and then, prior to 1950, lived in Indonesia, surviving three years with her four children in a civilian women's prison camp under Japanese occupation. In Australia she has worked as an accountant and in nursing. She began writing only in the late 1980s.