A great-granddaughter of psychic Robert James Lees, Douglass was born in Penola, South Australia.
She studied for her BA while working as a registered nurse, and later completed her PhD in early modern English History.
Until the mid-2000s, Douglass hosted a bulletin board on her website, with the aim of encouraging creative thinking and constructive criticism of others' work.
She maintained an online blog about the restoration project of her house and garden entitled Notes from Nonsuch in Tasmania.
Some of these novels also reached the Aurealis Fantasy division finals with The Nameless Day and The Crippled Angel from The Crucible finishing as finalists[11][12] and The Wounded Hawk winning the award in 2001.