A novelist, a memoirist, a travel writer and a journalist, SYLVIA FRASER was born in Hamilton, Ontario and graduated from the University of Western Ontario with an Honors B.A. in English & Philosophy. She began her writing career as a feature writer for The Toronto Star Weekly, travelling extensively throughout North America, including the Arctic, as well as Mexico, Panama, Europe, and Africa.  Her articles have won her many honors, including two Women's Press Club awards, a President's Medal, a Western Magazine Gold Medal and five National Magazine Medals.

Sylvia’s six novels range from the historical to the contemporary: Pandora (1972), The Candy Factory (1975), A Casual Affair (1978), The Emperor's Virgin (1980), Berlin Solstice (1984), The Ancestral Suitcase (1996). Literary Critic Elizabeth Westbrook described her writing as "the best kind of fiction: accessible and entertaining stories embedded in rich complexity."

Sylvia’s taboo-breaking bestseller - My Father's House: A Memoir of Incest and of Healing (1987) - was extensively translated and adapted for the stage. It received the Canadian Authors Association 1987 Non-Fiction Book Award, and was the basis for her receiving the 2007 Phoenix Women Rising Inaugural Award.  The New York Times Book Review described it as a chronicler of its times as significant as The Catcher in the Rye and To Kill a Mocking Bird.

Sylvia’s other non-fiction works are: The Book of Strange (1992), published in the United States as The Quest for the Fourth Monkey: A Thinker's Guide to the Psychic and Spiritual Revolution, where it was awarded a 1994 American Library Association Book List Medal. She has written two travel-quest books: The Rope in the Water: a Pilgrimage to India (2001) and The Green Labyrinth: Exploring the Mysteries of the Amazon (2003). Most recently she received the Matt Cohen Award: In Celebration of a Writing Life for her body of work.

For many years, Sylvia taught Creative Writing at Banff Centre. She has conducted numerous university workshops, and participated in extensive reading and media tours throughout Canada, the United States and Europe.  She served on the Arts Advisory Panel to Canada Council, and was a member of its 1985 Cultural Delegation to China. It was as a board member of The Writers' Trust that Sylvia had an opportunity to work for WiER.