The Canada Reads 2025 longlist is here!
The panellists and the books they choose to champion will be revealed on Jan. 23
Canada Reads is back! This year, the great Canadian book debate is looking for one book to change the narrative.
The books on this year's longlist all have the power to change how we see, share and experience the world around us.
The 2025 longlist is:
- The Whispers by Ashley Audrain
- Watch Out for Her by Samantha M. Bailey
- A Two-Spirit Journey by Ma-Nee Chacaby, with Mary Louisa Plummer
- What I Know About You by Éric Chacour, translated by Pablo Strauss
- The Pull of the Stars by Emma Donoghue
- When the Pine Needles Fall by Katsi'tsakwas Ellen Gabriel, with Sean Carleton
- Etta and Otto and Russell and James by Emma Hooper
- The Other Valley by Scott Alexander Howard
- Jennie's Boy by Wayne Johnston
- Becoming a Matriarch by Helen Knott
- Dandelion by Jamie Chai Yun Liew
- However Far Away by Rajinderpal S. Pal
- Clyde Fans by Seth
- Girl Runner by Carrie Snyder
- All Our Ordinary Stories by Teresa Wong
The five panellists and the five books they choose to champion will be revealed on Jan. 23, 2025.
The debates will take place March 17-20, 2025.
The year 2025 marks the 24th edition of Canada Reads.
Canada Reads premiered in 2002. The first winning book was In the Skin of a Lion by Michael Ondaatje, which was defended by musician Steven Page. In 2021, CBC Books put together a retrospective to look back at the show's biggest moments and its impact on Canadian literature.
Last year's winner was author Heather O'Neill, who championed The Future by Catherine Leroux, translated by Susan Ouriou.
Other past Canada Reads winners include Ducks, championed by Jeopardy! star and now Bookends host Mattea Roach, Five Little Indians by Michelle Good, championed by fashion journalist Christian Allaire, Lawrence Hill's The Illegal, championed by Olympian Clara Hughes, Kim Thúy's Ru, championed by TIFF artistic director Cameron Bailey and Lisa Moore's February, championed by comedian Trent McClellan.
You can see a complete list of past winners and contenders here.
Learn more about the 15 books on the Canada Reads 2025 longlist below.
If you'd like the Canada Reads books in an accessible format, both CELA and NNELS provide books in audio, braille, print braille and text formats. You can find out which formats are available for each of the books here for CELA and here for NNELS.
The Whispers by Audrey Audrain
In The Whispers, the truth behind a picture-perfect neighbourhood is revealed following an incident at a neighbourhood barbecue when the seemingly flawless hostess explodes in fury because her son disobeys her. When her son falls from his bedside window one night and she stops talking to everyone, the women in the neighbourhood begin to contend with what led to this horrible incident.
Ashley Audrain is the former publicity director of Penguin Canada. Her debut novel The Push was a New York Times bestseller and won the Best Crime First Novel at the 2022 Crime Writers of Canada Awards. She currently lives in Toronto.
Watch Out for Her by Samantha M. Bailey
Watch Out for Her is about a young mother named Sarah who thinks her problems are solved when she hires a young babysitter, Holly, for her six-year-old son. Her son adores Holly and Holly adores Sarah, who is like the mother she never had. But when Sarah sees something that she can't unsee, she uproots her family to start over. Her past follows her to this new life, raising paranoid questions of who is watching her now? And what do they want?
"I wanted to look at what happens when we're hiding our true selves," said Samantha M. Bailey in an interview with CBC Books. "I think only children are innocent. How can you be totally innocent if you're human? Because if you're human, that means you're flawed."
I also wanted to explore the idea that we can't watch who watches our children when we're not there.- Samantha M. Bailey
"And if you're human, that means you've been hurt and you've been traumatized and you've gone through difficult situations and you've hurt other people and you've made mistakes.
"I also wanted to explore the idea that we can't watch who watches our children when we're not there."
Bailey is a journalist and editor in Toronto. Her first thriller, Woman on the Edge, was released in 2019 and was an international bestseller. Her other novels include A Friend in the Dark and Hello, Juliet. Her journalistic work can be found in publications including NOW Magazine, The Village Post, The Thrill Begins and The Crime Hub.
A Two-Spirit Journey by Ma-Nee Chacaby, with Mary Louisa Plummer
In A Two-Spirit Journey, Ma-Nee Chacaby, an Objibwe-Cree lesbian who grew up in a remote northern Ontario community, tells the story of how she overcame experiences with abuse and alcohol addiction to become a counsellor and lead Thunder Bay's first gay pride parade.
"I want to leave something for my kids. My great-granddaughter and my great-grandsons," said Chacaby in an interview on The Next Chapter. "I want them to know what I was about, what I was made of, what I stood for. Because there is so much violence in the communities up north and around us."
We are storytellers. That is our gift.- Ma-Nee Chacaby
"I wish more Native women and older women, even the ones that are older than me, could write their story about their life to share it with other people so their kids can grow to understand them and learn from them.
"We are storytellers. That is our gift. And if they share their real stuff, what really happened in the past, the kids will learn from it."
Chacaby is a two-spirit Ojibwe-Cree writer, artist, storyteller and activist. She lives in Thunder Bay, Ont., and was raised by her grandmother near Lake Nipigon, Ont. Chacaby won the Ontario Historical Society's Alison Prentice Award and the Oral History Association's Book Award for A Two-Spirit Journey. In 2021, Chacaby won the Community Hero Award from the mayor of Thunder Bay.
Mary Louisa Plummer is a social scientist whose work focuses on public health and children's rights.
What I Know About You by Éric Chacour, translated by Pablo Strauss
In What I Know About You, Tarek is on the right path: he'll be a doctor like his father, marry and have children. But when he falls for his patient's son, Ali, his life is turned upside down as he realizes his sexuality against a backdrop of political turmoil in 1960s Cairo. In the 2000s, Tarek is now a doctor in Montreal. When someone begins to write to him and about him, the past that he's been trying to forget comes back to haunt him.
"At a moment, there is this incompatibility between the tradition and what he feels inside," said Éric Chacour in an interview on Bookends with Mattea Roach.
"So what was not a pressure at first becomes a pressure and becomes impossible to avoid. So he has to make a decision, quite radical, and flee away to Montreal."
There is this incompatibility between the tradition and what he feels inside.- Éric Chacour
What I Know About You was shortlisted for the 2024 Atwood Gibson fiction prize and the 2024 Giller Prize.
Chacour is a Montreal-based writer who was born to Egyptian parents and grew up between France and Quebec. He previously worked in the financial sector. What I Know About You is his first book and was a bestseller in its French edition, winning many awards, including the Prix Femina.
Pablo Strauss has translated 12 works of fiction, several graphic novels and one screenplay. He was a finalist for the Governor General's Literary Award for translation for The Country Will Bring Us No Peace, Synapses and The Longest Year. His translation of Le plongeur by Stephane Larue (The Dishwasher in English) won the 2020 Amazon First Novel Award. He lives in Quebec City.
The Pull of the Stars by Emma Donoghue
The Pull of the Stars, set in a war and disease-ravaged Ireland during the 1918 Spanish flu outbreak, tells the story of three women — a nurse, a doctor and a volunteer helper — working on the front lines of the pandemic in an understaffed maternity ward of a hospital, where expectant mothers infected with the virus are quarantined.
The book explores how these women change each other's lives in unexpected ways, while witnessing loss and delivering new life.
"I happened across an article about the centenary of the Spanish flu and was suddenly struck by the atmosphere of all these big, busy cities all over the world; these people, who much like us, had a very industrialized, speedy life," said Emma Donoghue in an interview with White Coat, Black Art.
"They were on trains and buses and cars, and even sometimes, airplanes. And their world was suddenly grinding to a halt because of the terror of this unknown illness."
Their world was suddenly grinding to a halt because of the terror of this unknown illness.- Emma Donoghue
"I realized that a historical novel about the flu of 1918 could have a very post-apocalyptic atmosphere … I wrote the whole novel before COVID.
"I wasn't thinking of any contemporary relevance whatsoever."
The Pull of the Stars was longlisted for the 2020 Scotiabank Giller Prize and shortlisted for the Trillium Book Award.
Donoghue is an Irish Canadian writer. Her books include the novels Learned by Heart, Landing, Room, Frog Music, The Wonder and the children's book The Lotterys Plus One. Room was an international bestseller and was adapted into a critically acclaimed film starring Brie Larson. It won the Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize, the Commonwealth Writers' Prize and was shortlisted for the Man Booker and Orange Prizes.
When the Pine Needles Fall by Katsi'tsakwas Ellen Gabriel, with Sean Carleton
When the Pine Needles Fall tells the story of Canada's violent siege of Kanehsatà:ke and Kahnawà:ke in 1990 from the perspective of Katsi'tsakwas Ellen Gabriel who was the Kanien'kehá:ka spokesperson during that time. The book covers her experiences leading up to the siege and her work as an activist for her community since.
Gabriel is a Kanien'kehá:ka, Wakeniáhton, artist, documentarian and Indigenous human rights and environmental rights activist. She lives in Kanehsatà:ke Kanien'kehá:ka Homelands.
Sean Carleton is a historian and professor in Indigenous studies at the University of Manitoba. He is also the author of Lessons in Legitimacy.
Etta and Otto and Russell and James by Emma Hooper
In the novel Etta and Otto and Russell and James, 82-year-old Etta decides to walk 3,232 kilometres to Halifax from her farm in Saskatchewan with little more than a rusty rifle and a talking coyote named James for company. Her early life with her husband Otto and their friend Russell are revealed in flashbacks to the Great Depression and the Second World War.
Emma Hooper is a Canadian musician and writer. Her other novels include Our Homesick Songs, which was on the longlist for the 2018 Scotiabank Giller Prize, and We Should Not Be Afraid of the Sky. She also holds a PhD in music-literary studies and has published her research on many related topics. Raised in Alberta, she currently lives in England.
The Other Valley by Scott Alexander Howard
The Other Valley follows the story of Odile Ozanne, who lives in a town with a magical valley. To the east, the town exists twenty years forward in time. To the west, it's 20 years behind. Odile seeks to join the Conseil, who decides which of the town's residents may cross the border into the valley to see departed loved ones.
When she recognizes two mourners by accident, Odile realizes they have travelled from the future to see someone Odile knows in her present — setting off a chain of events that change the course of several lives.
"The idea of rendering time travel as just as simple as geographical travel is the original conceit of the book," said Scott Alexander Howard in an interview on The Next Chapter. "What if there was no time machine? What if there was no wormhole or portal or anything like that? What if it was as simple as walking to the past or future?"
What if it was as simple as walking to the past or future?- Scott Alexander Howard
The Other Valley is Scott Alexander Howard's first novel. He holds a PhD in philosophy from the University of Toronto and was a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard. He currently lives in Vancouver.
Jennie's Boy by Wayne Johnston
Jennie's Boy is a memoir that recounts a six-month period in Wayne Johnston's chaotic childhood, much of which was spent as a frail and sickly boy with a fiercely protective mother. While too sick to attend school, he spent his time with his funny and eccentric grandmother Lucy and picked up some important life lessons along the way.
"I looked at all the years that I could remember and tried to pick out which one was most representative of what life was like, not just for me, but for my family of three brothers and my mom and dad — my mom, most people call Jennie," Johnston told Shelagh Rogers on The Next Chapter.
It was kind of the funniest year in a lot of ways, a bit sad in some other ways.- Wayne Johnston
"It was kind of the funniest year in a lot of ways, a bit sad in some other ways. And even though the book is called Jennie's Boy, I kind of struggled with the notion of calling it Lucy's Boy.
"That was my grandmother. I was her pet. And that's why I talked about it."
Jennie's Boy won the 2023 Stephen Leacock Memorial Medal.
Johnston is a writer, born and raised in Goulds, N.L. His novels include The Divine Ryans, A World Elsewhere, The Custodian of Paradise, The Navigator of New York and The Colony of Unrequited Dreams. His 1999 memoir, Baltimore's Mansion, won the RBC Taylor Prize. The Colony of Unrequited Dreams was shortlisted for the Scotiabank Giller Prize and was a 2003 Canada Reads finalist, when it was championed by now prime minister Justin Trudeau.
Becoming a Matriarch by Helen Knott
Becoming a Matriarch tells the story of Helen Knott's experience losing both her mother and grandmother in just over six months. The book explores themes of mourning, sobriety through loss and generational dreaming and redefines what it means to truly be a matriarch.
Becoming a Matriarch won the Jim Deva Prize for Writing that Provokes.
Knott is a poet, social worker and writer of Dane Zaa, Cree, Métis and mixed European descent from the Prophet River First Nation. She is also the author of the memoir In My Own Moccasins, which won the 2020 Saskatchewan Book Award for Indigenous Peoples' Publishing.
Knott is a juror for the 2025 CBC Nonfiction Prize.
Dandelion by Jamie Chai Yun Liew
Dandelion is a novel about family secrets, migration, isolation, motherhood and mental illness. When Lily was a child, her mother, Swee Hua, walked away from the family and was never heard from again. After becoming a new mother herself, Lily is obsessed with discovering what happened to Swee Hua.
She recalls growing up in a British Columbia mining town where there were only a handful of Asian families and how Swee Hua longed to return to Brunei. Eventually, a clue leads Lily to southeast Asia to find out the truth about her mother.
"I wanted to explore themes of belonging and place from an emotional place. I wrote about it academically in terms of how the law creates foreigners, but I wanted to explore how that feels — what that does to the psyche, how that affects someone's mental health," Liew told CBC Books.
I wanted to explore themes of belonging and place from an emotional place.- Jamie Chai Yun Liew
"There are a lot of assumptions about why people are stateless and the first one is that they are foreigners or migrants.
"And some stateless people are, but a lot of stateless people — millions around the world — are living within their home countries and overwhelmingly people told me, 'I'm being treated like a foreigner in my own country.'"
Liew is a lawyer, law professor and podcaster based in Ottawa. Dandelion is her first novel, which won her the Jim Wong-Chu Emerging Writers Award from the Asian Canadian Writers' Workshop. She also wrote the nonfiction book Ghost Citizens. Liew was named one of CBC Books writers to watch in 2022.
However Far Away by Rajinderpal S. Pal
However Far Away explores love, compromise and family set at a Sikh wedding. The book follows Devinder Gill who must navigate the emotional minefield of both his wife and his ex-girlfriend, with whom he's been having an affair, attending his nephew's wedding.
At first, Dev is certain nothing will come between him and his wife Kuldip, but as the day goes on, he realizes he does not have the control he thought. A series of threats including a curious daughter and an unwelcome guest only throw Dev's life into further disarray.
"I wanted a story that was sort of steeped in the Canadian Sikh culture," said Pal in an interview on The Next Chapter. "When I thought about what defines Canadian Sikh culture, wedding days are also extremely important in the culture."
"It's a multi-day event and lavish parties, lavish receptions. Almost a game of one-up-manship. If your son or daughter is getting married, it has to be bigger and better than somebody else's son or daughter's weddings, right? So that's what drew me to centering it around the wedding day. It also gives me a way of introducing so many aspects of the culture."
I wanted a story that was sort of steeped in the Canadian Sikh culture.- Rajinderpal S. Pal
Pal is a writer and stage performer based in Toronto. He has written the poetry collections pappaji wrote poetry in a language i cannot read and pulse. However Far Away is his first novel.
Clyde Fans by Seth
Seth's Clyde Fans illustrates the quiet desperation of two brothers struggling to keep their family's increasingly irrelevant business afloat. As homes adopt air conditioning, selling oscillating fans proves challenging — and less than fulfilling — for Simon Matchard, who struggles to shake off his dutiful brother's criticism.
"There used to be an actual business called Clyde Fans," Seth told CBC Books in an interview. "It was an old storefront and had a nice hand-lettered window with the big letters on it, just the way I've drawn it. I walked by it often and I didn't pay a tremendous amount of attention to it."
I walked by it often and I didn't pay a tremendous amount of attention to it.- Seth
"One day, for some reason, I looked more closely into the office. I think they were already out of business by this point. I looked in and could see inside the office, which was dark and very dated.
"It had a few desks, a counter, some typewriters, rotary phones and a couple of fans. On the back wall, there were two photographs: two portraits of two men. I can't remember what those photographs look like anymore, but they were standard black and white business portraits, which I assumed were the owners. That struck me as an evocative image and that floated around in my head.
"Eventually, I thought it would be interesting to make up the lives of these two."
Clyde Fans was on the 2020 Giller Prize longlist.
Seth is a cartoonist from Guelph, Ont. His other books include George Sprott, Wimbledon Green and The Great Northern Brotherhood of Canadian Cartoonists and the comic book series Palookaville. He has contributed to publications like The New Yorker and New York Times Magazine. He has twice won the Doug Wright Award for best book.
Girl Runner by Carrie Snyder
Girl Runner tells the story of Aganetha Smart, a former Olympic athlete who was famous in the 1920s, but now, at age 104, lives in a nursing home, alone and forgotten. When her quiet life is disturbed by the unexpected arrival of two young strangers, Aganetha begins to reflect on her childhood in rural Ontario and her struggles to make an independent life in the city.
"Running has certainly helped build my confidence as a writer," said Carrie Synder in an interview with CBC Books. "It's not artificial at all to set yourself a goal like finishing a race that you think you maybe can't complete, and then training and actually seeing your hard work pay off. There's something very, very rewarding in that experience."
Running has certainly helped build my confidence as a writer.- Carrie Snyder
Girl Runner was a finalist for the 2014 Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize.
Snyder is a fiction, nonfiction and children's book author. Her other books include the novel Francie's Got A Gun and short story collections The Juliet Stories, which was a finalist for the 2012 Governor General's Literary Award, and Hair Hat, which was shortlisted for the Danuta Gleed Award for Short Fiction. She is from Hamilton, Ont.
All Our Ordinary Stories by Teresa Wong
In the graphic memoir All Our Ordinary Stories, Teresa Wong uses spare black-and-white illustrations and thought-provoking prose to unpack how intergenerational trauma and resilience can shape our identities. Starting with her mother's stroke a decade ago, Wong takes a journey through time and place to find the origin of her feelings of disconnection from her parents.
The series of stories carefully examine the cultural, language, historical and personality issues that have been barriers to intimacy in her family.
"I'm really proud that I was able to kind of put all these stories down and uncover as much as I actually did," said Wong in an interview on Bookends with Mattea Roach.
In making the book, I was kind of making myself, in a way.- Teresa Wong
"In making the book, I was kind of making myself, in a way, shoring myself up in terms of understanding that these stories, these people, they contribute to who I am as a person and that I can draw on them, for examples of resilience and courage, but also learn from their mistakes as well."
Wong is the Calgary-based author of the graphic memoir Dear Scarlet, which was on the Canada Reads longlist in 2020 and a finalist for the City of Calgary W.O. Mitchell Book Prize. Her work has appeared in The Believer, The New Yorker, McSweeney's and The Walrus. CBC Books named her a writer to watch in 2019.
