150 Books that Tell the Story of Canada

Jeremy Thomas via Unsplash

Happy 150th Birthday CANADA!

In celebration of this sesquicentennial, and in true Canadian giving spirit, we wanted to share with you our meticulously crafted list of 150 books (of course) that tell the story of Canada. However, we know that everyone’s narrative of Canada is different. Please share with us the books that tell the story of YOUR Canada.

1. Roughing It In the Bush by Susanna Moodie, Susan Glickman
2. The History of Emily Montague by Frances Brooke
3. The Black Creek Stopping House by Nellie L. McClung
4. Anne of Green Gables by LM Montgomery
5. Two Solitudes by Hugh MacLennan
6. The Tin Flute by Gabrielle Roy
7. Who Has Seen the Wind by W.O Mitchell
8. Walsh by Sharon Pollock
9. Thirty Acres by Ringuet
10. As For Me and My House by Sinclair Ross
11. Forever Yours, Marie-Lou by Michel Tremblay
12. Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town by Stephen Leacock
13. Jalna by Mazo de la Roche
14. The Moccasin Maker by E. Pauline Johnson
15. Kamouraska by Anne Hébert
16. The Hockey Sweater by Roch Carrier
17. The Clockmaker by Thomas Chandler Haliburton
18. Beautiful Losers by Leonard Cohen
19. Never Cry Wolf by Farley Mowat
20. Montreal Stories by Mavis Gallant
21. The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz by Mordecai Richler
22. Canada Made Me by Norman Levine
23. The Stone Diaries by Carol Shields
24. Lives of Girls and Women by Alice Munro
25. In the Skin of a Lion by Michael Ondaatje
26. From Room to Room by Eli Mandel
27. No Great Mischief by Alistair MacLeod
28. The Book of Negroes by Lawrence Hill
29. Green Grass, Running Water by Thomas King
30. Perfection of the Morning by Sharon Butala
31. The Englishman’s Boy by Guy Vanderhaeghe
32. Rush Home Road by Lori Lansens
33. A Good House by Bonnie Burnard
34. Nights Below Station Street by David Adams Richards
35. Clara Callan by Richard B. Wright
36. The Wives of Bath by Susan Swann
37. Late Nights On Air by Elizabeth Hay
38. The Orenda by Joseph Boyden
39. The Bishop’s Man by Linden McIntyre
40. Fallen Angels by Barbara Gowdy
41. The Way the Crow Flies by Ann-Marie Macdonald
42. A Complicated Kindness by Miriam Toews
43. Judging Bertha Wilson by Ellen Anderson
44. Cataract City by Craig Davidson
45. The Colony of Unrequited Dreams by Wayne Johnston
46. Fugitive Pieces by Anne Michaels
47. Where She Has Gone by Nino Ricci
48. The Cure for Death by Lightning by Gail Anderson-Dargatz
49. Kay’s Lucky Coin Variety by Ann YK Choi
50. All That Matters by Wayson Choy
51. The Temptations of Big Bear by Rudy Wiebe
52. Fifth Business by Robertson Davies
53. Disappearing Moon Café by Sky Lee
54. Elizabeth and After by Matt Cohen
55. The Electrical Field by Kerri Sakamoto
56. Waiting for Joe by Sandra Birdsell
57. Leaving Earth by Helen Humphreys
58. Sweetland by Michael Crummey
59. Crow Lake by Mary Lawson
60. The Birth House by Ami McKay
61. Another Place, Not Here by Dionne Brand
62. The Secret Mitzvah of Lucio Burke by Steven Hayward
63. The Reason You Walk by Wab Kinew
64. All the Way by Jordin Tootoo
65. The Shipping News by Annie Proulx
66. The Time In Between by David Bergen
67. The Girl Who Was Saturday Night by Heather O’Neill
68. February by Lisa Moore
69. Canada by Richard Ford
70. The Sky is Falling by Kit Pearson
71. Lost in the Barrens by Farley Mowat
72. Angel Square by Brian Doyle
73. A Child in Prison Camp by Shizuye Takashima
74. Elijah of Buxton by Christopher Paul Curtis
75. From Anna by Jean Little
76. The Crazy Man by Pamela Porter
77. The Shadow in Hawthorn Bay by Janet Lunn
78. Monkey Beach by Eden Robinson
79. Black Robe by Brian Moore
80. The Canadians of Old by Aubert de Gaspe
81. Wacousta by John Richardson
82. Burning Water by George Bowering
83. A Discovery of Strangers by Rudy Wiebe
84. Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood
85. The Concubine’s Children by Denise Chong
86. Glengarry School Days by Ralph Conno
87. The Stone Angel by Margaret Laurence
88. The Sacrifice by Adele Wiseman
89. All Else is Folly by Peregrine Acland
90. God’s Sparrows by Philip Child
91. The Wars by Timothy Findley
92. Generals Die in Bed by Charles Yale Harrison
93. The Danger Tree by David Macfarlane
94. The Stone Carvers by Jane Urquhart
95. Waste Heritage by Irene Baird
96. Such is My Beloved by Morley Callaghan
97. Turvey by Earl Birney
98. Storm Below by Hugh Garner
99. Obasan by Joy Kowaga
100. Balconville by David Fennario
101. Indian Horse by Richard Wagamese
102. The Outlander by Gil Adamson
103. The Favourite Game by Leonard Cohen
104. Kiss of the Fur Queen by Tomson Highway
105. The Wreckage by Michael Crummey
106. Deafening by Frances Itani
107. What We All Long For by Dionne Brand
108. Stanley Park by Timothy Taylor
109. An Inconvenient Indian by Thomas King
110. King Leary by Paul Quarrington
111. Kit’s Law by Donna Morrissey
112. Cockroach by Rawi Hage
113. Consolation by Michael Redhill
114. The Game by Ken Dryden
115. Essex County by Jeff Lemire
116. Bride of New France by Suzanne Des Rochers
117. River Thieves by Michael Crummey
118. Fall on Your Knees by Anne-Marie MacDonald
119. Chorus of Mushrooms by Hiromi Goto
120. Brown Girl in the Ring by Nalo Hopkinson
121. Ru by Kim Thuy
122. Birdie by Tracey Lindberg
123. George & Rue by George Elliott Clarke
124. Woods Runner by Rejean Giguere
125. The Break by Katherena Vermette
126. Annabel by Kathleen Winter
127. Bone and Bread by Saleema Nawaz
128. Certainty by Madeleine Thien
129. Wild Geese by Martha Ostenso
130. The Double Hook by Sheila Watson
131. Diamond Grill by Fred Wah
132. When She Was Queen by M.G. Vassanji
133. Bear by Marian Engel
134. Settlers of the Marsh by Frederick Philip Grove
135. Icefields by Thomas Wharton
136. Klee Wyck by Emily Carr
137. Swamp Angel by Ethel Wilson
138. The Mountain and the Valley by Ernest Buckler
139. Next Episode by Hubert Aquin
140. In the Village of Viger by Duncan Campbell Scott
141. Rites of Spring by Modris Eksteins
142. Maria Chapdelaine by Louis Hemon, Michael Gnarowski
143. The Fire-Dwellers by Margaret Laurence
144. Love You Forever by Robert Munsch
145. Fifteen Dogs by Andre Alexis
146. Still Life by Louise Penny
147. Bloodletting & Miraculous Cures by Vincent Lam
148. The Promise of Canada by Charlotte Gray
149. Alligator Pie by Dennis Lee
150. A Student of Weather by Elizabeth Hay