Writers Miriam Toews, Louise Bernice Halfe and Élise Gravel among new Order of Canada appointees

CBC Books

· Posted: Jun 30, 2025 1:35 PM EDT | Last Updated: 6 hours ago

Manitoba-born writer Miriam Toews, Cree writer Louise Bernice Halfe and Montreal writer and illustrator Élise Gravel are among the 83 new appointees to the Order of Canada announced connected June 30, 2025.

Gov. Gen. Mary Simon's bureau announced 2 caller companions — the highest level of the Order of Canada — 19 officers and 62 members, the introductory honour level successful the order. One assignment is simply a promotion wrong the Order of Canada and different is an honorary appointment.

Toews has been made an officer for "her unsocial quality to represent precise quality stories of overcoming adversity and uncovering meaning," according to the authoritative announcement. 

Born successful Steinbach, Man., the Toronto-based Toews is the writer of 9 books including Fight Night, Women Talking, All My Puny Sorrows, A Complicated Kindness and The Flying Troutman.

She has won the Governor General's Literary Award for fiction, Writers' Trust Fiction Prize and the Writers' Trust Engel Findley Award. A Complicated Kindness won Canada Reads in 2006, erstwhile it was defended by John K. Samson. 

Toews' latest book, A Truce That Is Not Peace, is simply a memoir coming retired successful August. 

LISTEN | Miriam Toews connected Fight Night: 

Halfe, besides known by her Cree sanction Sky Dancer, has been made a member. She is simply a writer from the Saddle Lake Cree Nation successful Alberta. 

Her poesy collections include awâsis – kinky and disheveled, Bear Bones & Feathers, Blue Marrow, The Crooked Good and Burning successful this Midnight Dream. She served as Canada's ninth Parliamentarian Poet Laureate and was a Poet Laureate of Saskatchewan. 

Through her enactment successful some Cree and English, Halfe advocates for connection learning and preservation and articulates the past and experiences of Indigenous Peoples.

LISTEN | Louise B. Halfe Sky Dancer connected awâsis — kinky and dishevelled: 

Gravel was made a subordinate of the Order of Canada. She has written and illustrated implicit 50 books for children that person been translated into much than a twelve languages.

• Elise Gravel is committed to creating books that assistance children alteration the world

Her books include Club Microbe, Not Me, The Bat, The Worst Book Ever, The Mushroom Fan Club, I Want a Monster! and What Is a Refugee. Gravel won the Vicky Metcalf Award for Literature for Young People successful 2022 for her assemblage of work. She lives successful Montreal. 

Other literate appointees see Michel Rabagliati, Elizabeth Epperly and Marianne Dubuc.

New subordinate Rabagliati is a Montreal based cartoonist champion known for his recurring quality Paul. He has written respective semi-autobiographical comics including Paul Up North, Paul Goes Fishing and Paul Joins the Scouts. Paul astatine Home was on the shortlist for the 2021 Governor General's Literary Award for translation. 

• 25 years arsenic an illustrator, Quebecer and his comic honoured with Canada Post stamp

Epperly, based successful Nova Scotia, was made a subordinate for her assistance and penning astir the works of Lucy Maud Montgomery, the writer of Anne of Green Gables. She founded the L.M. Montgomery Institute astatine the University of Prince Edward Island 24 years ago.

Dubuc, a children's publication writer and illustrator from Montreal, was honoured arsenic a subordinate for her "stories, rooted successful quality and imbued with kindness," arsenic written successful the announcement. Her books include The Bus Ride, Lucy and Company and Mr. Postmouse's Rounds. Her enactment has been translated into much than 30 languages.

Read much astir the doctors, writers and a UFC champion who received Order of Canada honours here.

Writer Kim Thúy Ly Thanh, who was appointed a subordinate of the Order successful 2023, volition instrumentality portion successful an investiture ceremony, receiving her insignia, on July 1, 2025 successful Ottawa. The Quebec-based novelist and abbreviated communicative writer is known for her books Vi, Man and Ru, which won Canada Reads in 2015.

With files from Jessica Mundie