Dr. Gillian Turnbull, the Director of the Writing & Publishing Program, is pleased to announce the appointment of Wanda Taylor as a Cohort Director in the MFA in Fiction program.
Taylor, who has served as a mentor in the King’s MFA programs since 2018, comes to her new position with an extensive background in writing and publishing. She is the award-winning author of 11 books, including adult fiction and nonfiction, as well as middle-grade and young-adult fiction and nonfiction.
Nimbus will publish her most recent book, The Sky’s the Limit, a middle-grade nonfiction book, in February 2025. Her adult novel-in-progress, Our Fragile Life—adapted from the stage play she wrote and directed in 2018—was recently acquired and is set for release in 2026.
Taylor, a 2008 graduate of King’s one-year post-baccalaureate Journalism degree program, has also worked as a journalist, screenwriter and television producer, and taught journalism courses at King’s and Toronto’s Centennial College.
As a publishing industry acquisitions editor, she has acquired and championed titles from emerging and established authors and continues to support writers’ work as a freelance manuscript editor and sensitivity reader.
Taylor is currently the vice president of the Creative Non-Fiction Collective (CNFC), a national writers’ organization, and has been selected as the 2025 Mentor for the Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia’s Oliver-Craig Mentorship Program for emerging Black writers.
Taylor has won many awards, including the prestigious Progress Women of Excellence Award for Arts and Culture.
“I am a longtime admirer of Wanda’s work,” says Turnbull. “Her experience in writing, publishing and film far exceeds most writers I know, and she is a brilliant, energetic, sensitive colleague and a strong teacher. I’m looking forward to the new developments we’ll see in the MFA with her in this position.”
King’s offers two two-year limited residency MFA programs in Fiction and Nonfiction. Cohort Directors oversee each incoming class of students from admission to graduation, supervise the work of mentors, and assist with the administration of the Writing & Publishing Program.
Taylor, who will begin her new role in April 2025, replaces Stephen Kimber, retiring in June after a more than 40-year career at King’s. A three-term Director of the School of Journalism, Kimber co-founded the King’s MFA in Creative Nonfiction in 2013 and served as a Nonfiction Cohort Director for a decade before helping launch the MFA in Fiction as its first Cohort Director in 2023.
“This is perhaps among the more bittersweet moments I’ve experienced in the MFA,” says Turnbull. “Stephen was my Cohort Director when I was both a student and a mentor, and I can’t imagine the program without him. His guidance and leadership have been felt by everyone in the program. At the same time, I’m excited to see what Wanda brings to her new role.”
His retirement will coincide with the graduation of King’s first MFA in Fiction Class.
Inset photo of Wanda Taylor by Marsman Photographic
