Alison is the author of Singing the Dogstar Blues, a science-fiction comedy thriller, which won an Aurealis Award for Best Young Adult Novel, was listed as a Children's Book Council Notable Book, and was shortlisted for the 1999 Victorian Premier’s Literary Award for Young Adult Fiction. In 2003 it was also published in the UK, Germany and the US and was recently listed as an American Library Association Best Young Adult Book of 2004.

Alison lives in Melbourne, Australia, with her husband, Ron, and their two exuberant Parson Russell Terriers, Xander and Spike. She was the 1999 D. J. O’Hearn Memorial Fellow at Melbourne University, holds a Master of Arts, and teaches creative writing at postgraduate level. Alison is currently working on a fantasy duology based on Imperial China; the first volume will be published in 2007 in Australia by HarperCollins and Spring 2008 by Viking in the US.