Tiffany was born in West Yorkshire and migrated to Australia with her family in the early 1970s. She grew up in Perth, Western Australia. In her early twenties she worked as a park ranger in Central Australia.

In 1988 they moved to Sydney where she began work as a writer, focusing mainly on agriculture. Moving again, to Melbourne in 2000, Tiffany took up writing fiction and completed a creative writing course. She completed a Masters Degree in Creative Writing at RMIT University and is working towards her doctorate at Latrobe University.

Tiffany's debut novel, Everyman's Rules for Scientific Living, was a remarkable success on its release in 2005, winning several awards and shortlisted for some major awards, including the Miles Franklin Award and the Orange Prize.

• Everyman's Rules for Scientific Living

:*2003 won the Victorian Premier's Literary Award for an unpublished manuscript

:*2005 won the Western Australian Premier's Book Award for Fiction

:*2006 shortlisted for the Guardian First Book Award

:*2006 shortlisted for the Miles Franklin Award

:*2007 winner of the Dobbie Encouragement Award

:*2006 shortlisted for the Victorian Premier's Literary Award Vance Palmer Prize for Fiction

:*2007 shortlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction