Ann Nugent trained as a teacher at Kelvin Grove Teachers' College in Brisbane. She later completed her Arts Degree at the University of New England and received a Graduate Diploma in Cross Cultural Studies at Edith Cowan University, Western Australia. Her Master of Education was completed at the University of Queensland.
Nugent was co-founder of Blast, a Canberra literary magazine, and edited twenty issues between 1987 and 1993. In 2005 she began the new series of Blast. Nugent has written essays, drama and art criticism, as well as poetry and fiction. She has been a teacher in government schools and also a theatre critic and arts writer. From 1986 to 1996 Nugent was a theatre critic and theatre column writer for the Canberra Times.