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Staff & Board of Directors

See our Contact page for staff members’ email addresses and key areas of responsibility.

Oriana Duinker, Executive Director

Oriana Duinker (she/her) holds a Bachelor of Arts with combined honours in History and Music (Dalhousie/University of King’s College), a Masters in Medieval Studies (U of T), and a Masters in Museum Studies (U of T). Oriana’s CV spans several cultural fields, and her broad experience across the arts sector — including museum education, collections management, festival and event planning, and non-profit governance — contributes to her deep understanding of, and appreciation for, the role that arts and culture play in enriching public life. She joined WFNS as Executive Director in 2023, after serving as the Executive Director of the Hackmatack Children’s Choice Book Award. In Oriana’s spare time, she plays the French horn in Nova Sinfonia, trundles around Halifax on a Dutch cargo bike, makes more jam than her family can consume, and is raising two curious and creative little humans.

Andy Verboom, Program Manager (Membership Services)

Andy Verboom’s (his) literary studies at Dalhousie, U of Alberta, and Western U included specializations in contemporary poetry, postcolonial & feminist literatures, and critical theory. His communications experiences have included STEM & EAL instruction, web design, academic & literary editing, and print & digital publishing. He joined WFNS in 2018 to shepherd the organization through its extensive brand and website redesign process. He delights in a spreadsheet and is the caretaker of WFNS’s unofficial mascot, Bubba the chihuahua, Australian cattle dog, rat terrier, collie, beagle, redbone coonhound, supermutt mix. In his spare time, he publishes the digital literary and art magazine long con and collaborative poetry chapbooks through Collusion Books.

Linda Hudson, Program Manager (Arts Education)

Linda Hudson (she/her) earned an Bachelor of Arts (Honours) in English Literature from Mount Saint Vincent University, a Masters of Arts from Acadia University, and a Masters in Library and Information Studies. She has been employed at several institutions, providing her with diverse experience that helps guide her work for the WFNS. She has been a graduate Research Assistant at Acadia, completed her MLIS practicum at the Halifax Public Library, and was an intern at the Dalhousie Centre for Learning and Teaching. Linda has also assisted in the coordination of a number of events over the years (such as the annual CLT conference) and provided literacy training.

To contact a particular Board member, please send your message via Oriana Duinker, Executive Director, at director@writers.ns.ca.

Joanne Gallant, President

• Chair of Recruitment & Nominating Committee

Joanne Gallant is a registered nurse and writer from Halifax, Nova Scotia. In 2020, she was selected as an apprentice writer in WFNS’s Alistair MacLeod Mentorship Program. Her first book—A Womb in the Shape of a Heart—was published in 2021 and it won the Margaret and John Savage First Book Award for Non-Fiction. She’s had personal essays published in Oh Reader magazine, Mutha Magazine, and other online publications. She is former chair of the Fund Development Committee and helped organize both the Writing Rumble and Nova Swoons fundraisers. She has led two memoir-writing workshops and a MacPhee Summer Camp for Writing through WFNS and has been a Nova Writes reviewer and peer assessor and a CBC Non-Fiction Prize reader. She is active in the writing community, attending festivals such as AfterWords, workshops offered through WFNS, and a self-directed writing residency at Jampolis Cottage in 2024.

Whitney Moran, Vice President

• Chair of Fund Development Committee

Whitney Moran is the managing editor of Nimbus Publishing and has worked in the Atlantic Canadian publishing industry for nearly fifteen years. She has facilitated a number of workshops for WFNS during that time and has been grateful to serve on its Board of Directors since 2022, first as a Director-at-Large and for the past three years as Vice President and Chair of the Fund Development Committee. Whitney has also participated in the Writers In The Schools (WITS) program since 2023. The author of two books, East Coast Crafted (co-written by Christopher Reynolds) and I Want to Build a Seahouse (illustrated by Josee Bisaillon), she brings a wealth of experience with writers, event planning, and fundraising to her role on the WFNS Board of Directors, as well as an infectious passion for the distinct literary arts of this region.

Carol Shillibeer, Treasurer

• Chair of Finance Committee

Carol is an artist and poet and has worked as support, administration, and staff in the non-profit sector for decades, bringing with her a long history of work with artist-run nonprofits. As a retired academic, she blends her long-established interests in art and anthropology with investigations into what it means to be a writer in the contemporary world. She has published more than 200 poems in a variety of literary journals under a variety of heteronyms and published a chapbook in 2023 with Dancing Girl Press.

Becca Babcock, Secretary

Becca Babcock is a writer and a writing instructor, having published three books of fiction (Some There Are Fearless, 2023; One Who Has Been Here Before, 2021; and Every Second Weekend, 2011), with a fourth forthcoming (Driving Into the Sun, NeWest Press, 2026), as well as several short stories in literary journals in Canada and abroad. Since 2023, she has served as the WFNS Board Secretary. Previously, she served on the Board of Directors and Audience Engagement Committee for Eastern Front Theatre (2016 – 2019) and the Edmonton International Women’s Day Planning Committee (2003 – 2005), as well as several university and national student organization boards and committees, and other organizations in volunteer roles.

Past President

The Past President position has been left vacant for the 2026/2027 governance year.

To contact a particular Board member, please send your message via Oriana Duinker, Executive Director, at director@writers.ns.ca.

Sonja Boon

• Chair of Programs Committee

Sonja Boon is a mixed-race writer, researcher, flutist, and teacher. She’s a relatively new transplant to Nova Scotia, having formally moved to Halifax with her family in the summer of 2023. Since her arrival in NS, she’s been involved with WFNS in numerous capacities. A member of the Writers’ Council, she has served as a volunteer, instructor, and book award jury member. She currently serves on the Board of Riddle Fence literary magazine (St. John’s, NL) and is co-editor of the Life Writing series at Wilfrid Laurier University Press. She has previously served as Vice-President with WritersNL. In that position, she also chaired the Literary Awards committee. Finally, she’s served on a number of book award juries in different Canadian provinces, an honour that is both overwhelming and humbling. In her previous lives, she was a professional classical musician and a professor of gender studies, and both of these continue to influence her life and creative practice. Before moving to Halifax, Sonja and her family lived in St. John’s for 15 years and Vancouver for 11 before that! As an immigrant who arrived in Canada as a child, Sonja has lived in 7 provinces and on 3 continents.

Lindsey Harrington

• Chair of ad-hoc 50th Anniversary Committee

Lindsey Harrington is a Nova Scotian writer with Newfoundland roots. Her debut memoir, Nobody’s Mother, is forthcoming with Nimbus Publishing in fall of 2026. She has been an active member of WFNS since 2020 and originally joined the board in 2025. Outside of writing, she works in training, facilitation, and mediation in the field of labour relations. Her twenty-year career spans the nonprofit, private, and public sectors, and she holds an MBA from Memorial University.

Michelle Hébert

• Chair of Strategy & Policies Committee

Michelle Hébert is the author of Every Little Thing She Does is Magic (Vagrant, 2024), Enriched by Catastrophe: Social Work and Social Control after the Halifax Explosion (Fernwood, 2007), and A Good Girl’s Guide to Lying: Losing My Memory, Searching for Truth, & Confronting Complex Trauma (Nimbus, 2026). She has an MFA in creative nonfiction from the University of King’s College and degrees and experience in journalism and social work. Her creative work has appeared in magazines and newspapers across North America and on CBC Radio and has been long listed for the CBC Nonfiction Prize. Michelle has worked as executive director of a nonprofit, held director-level roles in government, and had a consultancy business which helped nonprofits with communications, engagement, and addressing governance and policy issues. She lives in Halifax with four cats and a dog, where she teaches creative writing with a focus on using trauma-informed practices to support both writers and readers.

Renée Hartleib

• Chair of Equity, Diversity, Inclusion, and Accessibility (EDIA) Committee

• Chair of Personnel Committee

Renée Hartleib is a writer and writing mentor based out of Halifax, Nova Scotia. She has authored two books: Writing Your Way: A 40-Day Path of Self-Discovery (2022) and Solo Camino: An Empowering Guide for Women (2025). A graduate of the Humber School of Writers, her short stories have been published in anthologies and literary journals across Canada. She has also worked as a professional writer and editor with a long list of clients. As a writing mentor, Renée considers it an honour to work one-on-one with writers who are completing book drafts or who require a sensitive and thorough review of completed manuscripts. Renée understands and appreciates the important work of the Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia, having been one of the first apprentices in the Alistair MacLeod Mentorship Program and also having served on the WFNS Board of Directors in the past.

Cory Lavender

• Chair of Jampolis Facilities Committee

Cory Lavender is a poet of African Nova Scotian and European descent living in the Kespukwitk district of Mi’kma’ki (Southwest Nova Scotia). His work has appeared in journals such as Grain, Prairie Fire, Riddle Fence, and The Fiddlehead and in Watch Your Head: Writers and Artists Respond to the Climate Crisis (Coach House Press, 2020). His full-length collection, Come One Thing Another (Gaspereau Press, 2024), won the 2025 Maxine Tynes Nova Scotia Poetry Award.

Tiffany Morris

Tiffany Morris is an L’nu’skw (Mi’kmaw) writer from Nova Scotia. She is the author of the horror novella Carnalis, the Indie Ink Award-winning novella Green Fuse Burning, and the Elgin Award-winning horror poetry collection Elegies of Rotting Stars. Her work has appeared in the Indigenous horror anthology Never Whistle At Night, as well as in Nightmare Magazine, Uncanny Magazine, and Apex Magazine, among others. She is one of the founding Directors of Tricon: The Trident Conference for Speculative Fiction.

Danica Roache

• Chair of Membership & Engagement Committee

Danica Roache is a mixed ancestry Mi’kmaw mother-of-four living in Kjipuktuk. Danica holds a BA with combined honors in English and Creative Writing from Dalhousie University. She was commissioned by WFNS to write an essay for Rita Joe Heritage Day events in 2023. A graduate of the Alistair MacLeod Mentorship Program (with mentor Stephanie Domet), Danica is working on her first novel.

Jamie Samson

Jamie Samson is a former lawyer and current Master’s student in philosophy who has always had a passion for reading and writing. Though not a professional author, words are the greatest joy of her life, and she loves to support local initiatives that inspire other members to explore the joy of language.

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Experience Levels

The Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia (WFNS) uses the following terms to describe writers’ experience levels:

  • New writers: those with less than two years’ creative writing experience and/or no short-form publications (e.g., short stories, personal essays, or poems in literary magazines, journals, anthologies, or chapbooks).
  • Emerging writers: those with more than two years’ creative writing experience and/or numerous short-form publications.
  • Early-career authors: those with 1 or 2 book-length publications or the equivalent in book-length and short-form publications.
  • Established authors: those with 3 or 4 book-length publications.
  • Professional authors: those with 5 or more book-length publications.

Please keep in mind that each form of creative writing (fiction, nonfiction, poetry, writing for children, writing for young adults, and others) provides you with a unique set of experiences and skills, so you might consider yourself an ‘established author’ in one form but a ‘new writer’ in another.

Occasionally, WFNS uses the phrase “emerging and established writers/authors” to mean ‘writers and authors of all experience levels.’

The “Recommended experience level” section of each workshop description refers to the above definitions. A workshop’s participants should usually have similar levels of creative writing and / or publication experience. This ensures that each participant gets value from the workshop⁠ and is presented with info, strategies, and skills that suit their experience. 

For “intensive” and “masterclass” workshops, which provide more opportunities for peer-to-peer feedback, the recommended experience level should be followed closely.

For all other workshops, the recommended experience level is just that—a recommendation—and we encourage potential participants to follow their own judgment when registering.

If uncertain about your experience level with respect to any particular workshop, please feel free to contact us at communications@writers.ns.ca