Lorinda Toledo

• Ph.D. Department of English, University of Nevada, Las Vegas.
• M.F.A. Creative Writing, Fiction/Nonfiction, Antioch University Los Angeles. 
• B.A. Print Journalism and Spanish, University of New Mexico.

Lorinda Toledo’s (she/her) novel-in-progress, The Nature of Fire, was named first runner-up for the 2019 James Jones First Novel Fellowship. Her stories have been published in the Mississippi Review, The Normal School, Lit Angels, and elsewhere. She earned a doctorate in literature with a creative dissertation from the University of Nevada Las Vegas, where she was a Barrick Graduate Fellow and a Black Mountain Institute Ph.D. Fellow. Her M.F.A. is in Creative Writing from Antioch University Los Angeles. She served as Fiction Editor at Witness literary magazine, Lunch Ticket, and more. She is currently revising her novel with her agent.

Lorinda also holds a B.A. in Journalism from the University of New Mexico, working with news organizations across the country, including the Associated Press’s Los Angeles bureau, the Albuquerque Tribune, LA Weekly, and The New York Times Student Journalism Institute. She was born and raised in New Mexico, while Los Angeles has been her home for more than a decade.

Lorinda currently teaches LIBS 440 Capstone. She has taught ENGL 107 Writing in the Digital Age and originally joined Otis as Assistant Director of the Student Learning Center from 2022–2024, where she led tutoring and developed a coaching program to help creatives cultivate sustainable practice. She has taught writing since 2013 at AULA and UNLV both as a tutor and in the classroom. As an educator, Lorinda seeks to empower students to intersect coursework with their lived experiences and career goals in a supportive environment.