Alison Anderson grew up in a university town on the East Coast, but quite young in life figured out she didn't belong there, and spent as much time as she could in Europe, (primarily in Switzerland but also in Greece, France and England), where she acquired the usual life adventures, and then some: foreign languages, ski accidents, university degrees in French, Russian and translation, English teaching positions in Athenian suburbs and French fishing villages, a husband and, always, a love of literature.