Annie O'Dowd lived as a child in the Queensland outback. One of a family of seven, her love of reading and drawing was fostered by the isolation and the brown edge of the horizon. Her first stories were written in the Mahrigong state school, a one teacher school with only sixteen pupils. When her family moved to the city, she attended a local girls' school where she illustrated school books for the entertainment of her friends. O'Dowd initially wanted to be an actor and trained at the University of Southern Queensland, Toowoomba; however, she became a speech and drama teacher at a girls' high school.
