Nancy Mairs was born Nancy Pedrick Smith in Long Beach, California on July 23, 1943. She received a bachelor's degree from Wheaton College in 1964. She worked as a publications editor for the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory in Cambridge and the International Tax Program at Harvard Law School. She received an M.F.A. in poetry in 1975 and a doctorate in English in 1983 from the University of Arizona. Her dissertation was published as Plaintext: Deciphering a Woman's Life in 1986.
In her late 20s, she suffered from agoraphobia and depression and once attempted suicide. Soon afterward, she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. She wrote several memoirs including Remembering the Bone-House: An Erotics of Place and Space, Carnal Acts, Ordinary Time: Cycles in Marriage, Faith and Renewal, Voice Lessons: On Becoming a (Woman) Writer, Waist-High in the World: A Life Among the Nondisabled, and A Dynamic God: Living an Unconventional Catholic Faith. She also published two collections of poetry entitled Instead It Is Winter and In All the Rooms of the Yellow House. In 2001, she wrote A Troubled Guest: Life and Death Stories. She died on December 3, 2016 at the age of 73.
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