Canada book series in reading order

by Eric Wright

by Don Easton

Janette Oke, born Janette Steeves on 18 February 1935, is a Canadian author of inspirational fiction, often set in pioneer times with women as the lead characters. Bethany House published Love Comes Softly, the first Oke novel, in 1979. When Calls the Heart (1983) opened the Canadian West series and became the basis for a television series with the same title. The catalogue holds 79 Oke books, with The Pharisee's Wife (2025) the newest. Series include Love Comes Softly, Prairie Legacy, Women of the West, Song of Acadia and Janette Oke's Animal Friends. Subjects include women pioneers, Canada and Christian fiction.

Charlie Salter heads the main series of Eric Wright, a Canadian mystery novelist who lived from May 4, 1929 to October 9, 2015. The catalogue lists 25 Wright books, starting with The Night the Gods Smiled (1983) and ending with The Land Mine (2016). Beyond Salter, Wright wrote the Joe Barley, Mel Pickett and Lucy Trimble Brenner series. The catalogue files the Wright books under police procedural mysteries, with Toronto among the settings. Smoke Detector (1984) and Death in the Old Country (1985) are early titles.

Farley Mowat

38 books• 1 series

Farley Mowat (1921-2014) was a Canadian writer and environmentalist whose work was translated into 52 languages and sold more than 17 million copies. People of the Deer (1950) opens a catalogue of 38 titles and begins Mowat's writing on the Canadian north, its Inuit peoples and the Arctic. Never Cry Wolf (1963), an account of life among Arctic wolves, was filmed in 1983. Mowat wrote for children as well, taking the Vicky Metcalf Award in 1970, and the catalogue closes at Eastern Passage (2010).

Mazo de la Roche

31 books• 2 series

Mazo de la Roche (1879–1961), born Maisie Louise Roche, was a Canadian writer. The Jalna novels, a chronicle of the Whiteoak family set at Jalna in Ontario, were among the most widely read series of their day, running from Jalna (1927) through Whiteoaks of Jalna (1929), Finch's Fortune (1931), The Master of Jalna (1933) and The Building of Jalna (1935). Thirty-one books are catalogued, plays among them, with family life and Canadian social history the standing subjects.

Robertson Davies

31 books• 4 series

Robertson Davies was a Canadian novelist, playwright, critic, journalist and professor, and the founding Master of Massey College at the University of Toronto. The fiction comes in trilogies: Salterton, opening with Tempest-Tost (1951); Deptford, opening with Fifth Business (1970) and continuing through The Manticore (1972) and World of Wonders (1975); Cornish; and Toronto. Thirty-one titles are catalogued, essays, criticism and diaries among them, ending with A Celtic Temperament: Robertson Davies as Diarist (2015).

Michael Slade writes police thrillers about serial killers, set in British Columbia and built around the Royal Canadian Mounted Police unit Special X. Robert DeClerq leads the investigations. Headhunter (1984) opens the catalogue, followed by Ghoul, Cutthroat, Ripper and Hangman, and 15 books run to Headhunter Reimagined in 2018, at a median of 404 pages.

Carol Ann Shields, born Warner on June 2, 1935 and died July 16, 2003, was a Canadian novelist and short story writer. The Stone Diaries, published in 1993, won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in the United States and the Governor General's Award in Canada. The catalogue holds 29 books dated between 1972 and 2021, among them Small Ceremonies (1976), The Box Garden (1977), Various Miracles (1985) and Swann (1987), and it closes with The Collected Poetry of Carol Shields (2021). Recorded subjects include Canadian women authors, families, mothers and daughters, and married people.

Margaret Atwood

89 books• 8 series

Margaret Atwood, born November 18, 1939, is a Canadian novelist, poet, literary critic and inventor. The Handmaid's Tale, a dystopian novel from 1985, is the best-known Atwood work. Atwood's output includes 18 poetry books, 18 novels, 11 non-fiction books, nine short fiction collections, eight children's books and two graphic novels. The catalogue opens with The Circle Game (1964) and runs to Book of Lives (2025), with The Edible Woman (1969) and Surfacing (1972) along the way. Series include MaddAddam, Handmaid's Tale and Angel Catbird. Awards include two Booker Prizes, the Arthur C. Clarke Award, the Franz Kafka Prize and the Order of Canada.

Alice Munro

28 books

Alice Munro (1931–2024) built a career on short fiction across five decades of publishing. The Canadian writer took the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2013 and the Man Booker International Prize in 2009 for her body of work. Her stories are set most often in Huron County in southwestern Ontario and move forward and backward in time within linked cycles, taking women, families and small-town manners as their material. 28 books are catalogued, from Dance of the Happy Shades (1968) onward, including Lives of Girls and Women (1971), The Beggar Maid (1977) and Open Secrets (1994).

Jean Margaret Laurence (née Wemyss; July 18, 1926 - January 5, 1987) was a Canadian novelist and short story writer, and ranks among the major figures of Canadian literature. Laurence founded the Writers' Trust of Canada, a non-profit organization set up to support the country's writing community. The catalogue holds 23 books, from A Tree for Poverty (1954) to Recognition and Revelation (2020), taking in This Side Jordan (1960), The Prophet's Camel Bell (1963), The Stone Angel (1964) and A Jest of God (1966). The Manawaka Sequence is the series recorded under Laurence's name, and subjects include Canadian fiction, women, travel, correspondence and biography.

Vicki Delany, born Victoria Ann Cargo in Winnipeg, Manitoba, in 1951, is a Canadian mystery novelist with nine mystery series. Delany belongs to Crime Writers of Canada and Capital Crime Writers and appears on panels at Bouchercon, Malice Domestic and Bloody Words. The catalogue lists 58 books, from Whiteout (2000) to Whose Body in the Library (2026). Series include Sherlock Holmes Bookshop Mystery, Year-Round Christmas Mysteries, Constable Molly Smith, Tea By The Sea Mysteries, Klondike Mysteries and Catskill Summer Resort Mysteries.

Charles de Lint, a Canadian writer born December 22, 1951, works mainly in fantasy, covering urban fantasy, contemporary magical realism and mythic fiction. During the 1980s de Lint, together with Terri Windling, Emma Bull and John Crowley, helped establish urban fantasy as a subgenre. The output includes novels, novellas, short stories, poetry and song lyrics. The catalogue records 95 books from Moonheart (1984) to Juniper Wiles Does Not Want to Be Queen (2025), with Mulengro (1985), Yarrow (1986), Greenmantle (1988) and Wolf Moon (1988) among the early titles. Newford, an imaginary place in the subject headings, names a series, alongside Moonheart, Cerin Songweaver, Jack of Kinrowan and Juniper Wiles.

Eric Walters

207 books• 18 series

Eric Walters, full name Eric Robert Walters, is a Canadian author of young adult fiction and picture books, born March 3, 1957 and the writer of more than 130 books. The catalogue lists 207 books from Stand Your Ground (1994) to Werewolves Don't Keep Diaries (2026). Series include Camp X, Rule of Three, Orca Echoes, Tiger, War Of The Eagles, We All Fall Down, Catboy and Teen Astronauts. Subjects include basketball, survival, orphans, the Second World War and adventure.

Hockey runs through Roy MacGregor's books. The Screech Owls series puts a young hockey team into mysteries and adventures, from Mystery at Lake Placid (1995) onward, and the Ice Chips books carry that line to The Ice Chips and the Killer Wave (2021). MacGregor also wrote about the professional game in Road Games: A Year in the Life of the NHL (1993). The listing holds 56 books dated 1983 to 2021, at a median of 156 pages.

Gary Paulsen

181 books• 17 series

Survival and outdoor adventure run through Gary Paulsen's writing for young readers. The catalogue holds 181 books, from Some Birds Don't Fly (1968) to Northwind (2022), at a median length of 105 pages. Brian Robeson, Francis Tucket, Duncan Culpepper, Murphy and the World of Adventure books head the series lines, with non-fiction and picture books alongside. No new Paulsen title has appeared since 2022.

Luanne Rice, born 25 September 1955, is an American novelist whose books frequently turn to nature, the sea, love and family. The catalogue lists 42 Rice titles, from Angels All Over Town (1985) to Until Midnight (2026), including Crazy in Love, Firefly Beach, The Lemon Orchard and Beach Girls. Subjects on file include sisters, mothers and daughters, Connecticut, suspense and missing persons. Series include Hubbard's Point/Black Hall, Newport, Rhode Island and Detective Conor Reid, and Rice's work has been translated into 26 languages.

L.M. Montgomery

57 books• 9 series

Lucy Maud Montgomery (November 30, 1874 to April 24, 1942) was a Canadian author who published as L. M. Montgomery. Anne of Green Gables (1908) began the body of work Montgomery is known for, and the orphan Anne Shirley brought Montgomery fame and an international readership. The career produced 20 novels plus more than a thousand short stories and poems, alongside essays. The catalogue lists 57 books, from Anne of Green Gables to editions dated 2025, and holds the Anne Shirley, Emily and Silver Bush series and the published journals.

Romantic suspense is Loreth Anne White's field. Sixty-six titles run from Melting the Ice (2003) to The Black Orchid (2026), across the Shadow Soldiers, Sahara Kings, Angie Pallorino, Wild Country, Dark Lure, Snowy Creek and Bellona Channel series. Horse racing, Canada, widows and women journalists appear in the subject tags.

Tanya Huff

67 books• 13 series

Tanya Huff, born in 1957, is a Canadian fantasy author published since the late 1980s. The Blood Books, whose detective is Vicki Nelson, were adapted for television as Blood Ties. The catalogue records 67 books from Child of the Grove (1988) to Saved by the Spell (2026), with Vicki Nelson, Confederation, Quarters, Peacekeeper, Smoke Trilogy, Gale Women and Wizard of the Grove among the series listed. Vampires, wizards, witches and life on other planets appear in the recorded subjects, and Doctor Who and Valdemar are also logged against the listing.

Gail Bowen was a Canadian novelist, playwright and educator who died in 2026. The Joanne Kilbourn mysteries are her principal sequence, featuring a woman college teacher as sleuth and catalogued under Saskatchewan. Bowen's 34 books span 1987 to 2025, from 1919, The Love Letters Of George & Adelaide to The Solitary Friend, and take in the Charlie D books, stage plays and non-fiction.

Susan Page Davis writes Christian romance, romantic suspense and mystery, with 111 books in the catalogue from Protecting Amy (2004) to Dumpsters and Dragons (2026). Breaking News (2005), The Oregon Escort (2006), The Prisoner's Wife (2006) and Frasier Island (2007) are among the earlier titles. Davis series include Maine Justice, True Blue Mysteries, Ladies' Shooting Club, Mainely Romance, Mainely Mysteries, Maine Brides, White Mountain Brides, Alaska Wedding, Homeward Trails, Skirmish Cove Mysteries and Prairie Dreams. Subjects include historical fiction, murder, Maine and inspirational fiction.

Maggie K. Black has 37 catalogued books, from Killer Assignment (2013) to Uncovering Explosive Secrets (2026). Unsolved Case Files, True North Heroes, Protected Identities and True North Bodyguards are the listed series. Romantic suspense, Christian suspense, women journalists, Canada, kidnapping and blizzards appear among the subjects. Deadline (2014), Headline: Murder (2015), Kidnapped at Christmas (2016), Tactical Rescue (2016) and Rescue at Cedar Lake (2017) are other titles.

Ron Corbett writes Canadian crime fiction and non-fiction. The Frank Yakabuski novels, Ragged Lake (2017), Cape Diamond (2018), Mission Road (2020), and the Danny Barrett books are his two series, while other titles are travel and photographic works on Canada, among them The Gatineau (1994) and The Rideau Canal Then and Now (2020). The catalogue holds 14 books, reaching Back Channel (2025). Murder, police procedure and logging fill the subject tags.

James Oliver Curwood

45 books• 2 series

James Oliver Curwood (June 12, 1878 - August 13, 1927) was an American action-adventure writer and conservationist. Curwood set many books in the Hudson Bay region, the Yukon or Alaska, and Publishers Weekly placed them among the top-ten US best sellers in the early and mid 1920s. At least 180 films draw on Curwood's novels and short stories. At death, Curwood was the world's highest-paid author per word. The catalogue holds 45 titles, beginning with The Wolf Hunters and The Courage of Captain Plum in 1908, and includes the Kazan and Baree series. Subjects include wolves, dogs, bears, mounted police and gold mining in Canada.