As a result of her parents' frequent journeys with their children, she did not finish elementary school until she was much older than normal students making her essentially a self-taught writer.

[5] In 1921, while her father was on a trip to Portugal, Maria Archer married a Portuguese man, Alberto Teixeira Passos and the young couple took up residence on the island of Ibo in Mozambique.

Five years later, after the fall of the democratic regime there and the subsequent crisis, her husband lost his job at a bank and the two moved to Faro, Portugal.

[4][6] She called her first book, Três Mulheres (Three Women), a soap opera,[6] which was published in the same volume that contained a police adventure story by António Pinto Quartin, A Lenda e o Ação do Estranho Caso de Pauling.

In 1945, she also became an activist, joining the group called Movement of Democratic Unity (MUD), consisting of those opposed to the repressive regime of President Salazar in Portugal.

According to the writer Dina Botelho,[4]"She closely followed the trial of the challenger of the Salazar dictatorship, Captain Henrique Carlos Galvão at the Military Court of Santa Clara.

[4] Finally, in 1979, she returned to Lisbon for the last time, moving into a long-term residential care facility called Manor of Santa Maria de Marvila on 26 April.