It was in Houston, Texas, on December 9, 1915, that the family of Loy and Genevive Jarvis welcomed their daughter, Eloise, into the world. Though she grew to be interested in a variety of pursuits, McGraw determined, at the age of eight, when she wrote her first story, that she would be a writer. Still, the path to that goal was not entirely straight. After graduating from Principia College in 1937, she pursued graduate study in painting and sculpture at Oklahoma University in 1938 and Colorado University in 1939. On January 29, 1940, she married William Corbin McGraw, a writer and filbert grower. The couple soon had two children, Anthony and Lauren Lynn.

In 1943 and 1944, McGraw began her career as an instructor in portrait and figure painting at Oklahoma City University. In 1949, she began to write seriously, and after that she produced twenty-two novels, including The Moorchild (1996), Steady Stephanie, a one...