The girls and I have been studying Canadian history along with some fellow Vancouver homeschoolers this year. One of my favourite ways to experience history is through a story, so I began compiling a list of books about Canadian history. Here for you is my list of 100 great books for Canadian tween girls.
My criteria for picking these books for Canadian tween girls:
- All the books on this list are by a Canadian author or about a Canadian person, place or event.
- All the books are about a Canadian girl or woman, or feature a female protagonist or main character.
- Most of the book are fiction, but there are also some graphic novels, autobiographies or biographies, and nonfiction.
- These books should be suitable for tween girls, ages 8-12 or about grades 2-6. That is a wide range of ages and reading abilities, so please peruse the books yourself to see if they are suitable for your daughter’s reading level.
While Sunshine, Lily and I have read and enjoyed many of the books on this list, we haven’t read them all. I’ve done my best to research each book for it’s suitability for Canadian tween girls. If you have any remarks about these books, or recommendations for books that would be a good fit for this list, please feel free to leave a comment or email me.
You can probably find many of these books for Canadian tween girls at your local library. I’ve included Amazon links for most so you can find more information, read reviews, or buy the books if you wish. If you do purchase the book using my link, I’ll receive a small commission.
A note about religious bias: Three of these books are biographies of Canadian Catholic saints. If you’re not Catholic, I’d encourage you to read these books from a historical perspective, for the insight they offer into an interesting time period. Other books on this list are about families of other faiths, including Puritan and Jewish. You may wish to discuss any faith differences from your own with your daughters. Many of the books on this list demonstrate that we shouldn’t judge others based on their gender, skin colour, cultural background, faith, or country of origin.
Want to print this list? Subscribe to my email newsletter for a FREE printable of this book list, with check boxes for each book. I’ve also made a second list with the books organized chronologically, if you wish to read your way through Canadian history. Plus, this printable includes a “Book Report” for your child to fill in after they’ve read the books. Use it to create a fun reading log or scrapbook, or simply as proof of learning to show their homeschool teacher.
100 Great Books for Canadian Tween Girls
A Day of Signs and Wonders by Kit Pearson (historical fiction about artist Emily Carr in Victoria, BC in 1881)
A Desperate Road to Freedom (Dear Canada novel about the Underground Railroad in 1864)
A Prairie As Wide as the Sea (Dear Canada novel about Canadian immigrants in Saskatchewan in 1926)
A Question of Loyalty by Barbara Greenwood (historical fiction about the 1837 Rebellion in Upper Canada)
A Rebel’s Daughter (Dear Canada novel about the 1837 Rebellion in Upper Canada)
A Ribbon of Shining Steel (Dear Canada novel about building Canada’s railway in 1882)
A Sea of Sorrows (Dear Canada novel about the typhus epidemic in 1847)
A Stranger at Home by Margaret Pokiak-Fenton (memoir about an Inuit girl’s return home after being in a residential school in the 1940s; sequel to Fatty Legs)
A Whale Tale (Our Canadian Flyer novel about Captain Cook and the Nootka peoples in 1778)
All Aboard! (Our Canadian Flyer novel about the last spike at Craigellachie in 1885)
All Fall Down (Dear Canada novel about Frank Slide in Alberta in 1902)
Alone in an Untamed Land
Ambush in the Foothills by Bill Bains (historical novel about the Bains family in the Canadian foothills in the 1870s)
An Ocean Apart (Dear Canada novel about Chinese immigrants in Vancouver in 1922)
Angelique: Buffalo Hunt by Cora Taylor (Our Canadian Girl series about a Metis girl in 1865)
Anne of Green Gables by L. M. Montgomery (graphic novel version of the classic novel about Canada’s famous red-headed orphan)
Arctic Storm (Our Canadian Flyer novel about Arctic scientists in 1976)
Banished From Our Home (Dear Canada novel about Acadia in 1755)
Beware, Pirates! (Our Cnadian Flyer novel about early Canadian explorer Martin Frobisher in 1577)
Blessed Marie of New France by Mary Fabyan Windeatt (historical fiction about a nun in New France in the early 1600s)
Blood Upon Our Land (Dear Canada novel about the Northwest Resistance in 1885)
Brothers Far From Home (Dear Canada novel about World War I in 1916)
Calico Captive by Elizabeth George Speare (historical fiction about a Puritan girl captured by Iroquois and sold to the French in Quebec in 1754)
Charlotte by Janet Lunn (a true tale of a girl whose cousins move to Canada during the American Revolution in the 1770s)
Crazy for Gold (Our Canadian Flyer novel about the Klondike Gold Rush in the 1890s)
Danger on the Tracks
Days of Toil and Tears (Dear Canada novel about child labour in Ontario in 1887)
Elizabeth: Bless This House by Anne Laurel Carter (Our Canadian girl series about Planters in Nova Scotia in the 1760s)
Ellen: Hobo Jungle by Dorothy Joan Harris (Our Canadian girl series about Depression-era Vancouver in 1939)
Emily: Across the James Bay Bridge by Julie Lawson (Our Canadian Girl series about Chinese immigrants in Vancouver in 1896)
Emily Stowe by Janet Ray (biography about the first woman to practice medicine in Canada in 1876)
Emily Murphy by Donna James (a biography of a Canadian suffragette)
Exiles From the War (Dear Canada novel about World War II in 1940)
Factory Girl by Barbara Greenwood (fiction and nonfiction about a girl who works in a child labour factory in 1912)
Far From Home (Our Canadian Flyer novel about World War II in 1945)
Fatty Legs by Christy Jordan-Fenton (autobiographical book about an Inuit girl in a Canadian residential school in the 1940s)
First Spring on the Grand Banks by Bill Freeman (historical fiction about the Bains family in Newfoundland in the 1870s)
Flying High (Our Canadian Flyer novel about Alexander Graham Bell in 1909)
Footsteps in the Snow (Dear Canada novel about Red River, Manitoba in 1815)
From Anna by Jean Little (historical fiction about a Jewish girl who immigrates to Canada with her family during World War II in 1933)
Halifax Explodes (Our Canadian Flyer novel about the Halifax explosion in 1917)
Hurry, Freedom (Our Canadian Flyer novel about the Underground Railroad in 1858)
If I Die Before I Wake (Dear Canada novel about the flu epidemic in 1918)
Irish Chain by Barbara Haworth-Attard (historical fiction about a girl with dyslexia in Halifax in 1917)
Izzie: The Christmas That Almost Wasn’t by Budge Wilson (Our Canadian Girl series about a girl in Nova Scotia during World War II)
Jo’s Journey by Nikki Tate (historical fiction about a girl disguised as a boy during the Cariboo Gold Rush in 1861)
Justine McKeen, Queen of Green by Sigmund Brouwer (a modern day girl who is trying to save the planet, one person and one cause at a time)
Kateri Tekakwitha, Mohawk Maiden by Evelyn M. Brown (historical fiction about St. Kateri Tekakwitha, the first Native American to be canonized a saint)
Keeley: The Girl from Turtle Mountain by Deborah Ellis (Our Canadian Girl series about Frank Slide in 1901)
Kidmonton: True Stories of River City Kids by Linda Goyette (short stories about various Edmonton events from ancient times through present day in the eyes of a child at the time)
Laura Secord: A Story of Courage by Janet Lunn (biography of a Canadian woman during the War of 1812)
Last Voyage of the Scotian by Bill Freeman (historical novel about the Bains family in Quebec in the 1870s)
Lisa: Overland to Cariboo by Priscilla Galloway (Our Canadian Girl series about the Cariboo Gold Rush in 1862)
Lost in the Snow (Our Canadian Flyer novel about the filles du roi or “king’s daughters” in New France in the 1650s)
Madeleine Takes Command by Ethel C. Brill (historical fiction based on the true story of Madeleine de Vercheres in New France in 1692)
Make It Fair! (Our Canadian Flyer novel about Nellie McClung and women’s rights in 1914)
Marie-Claire: Dark Spring by Kathy Stinson (Our Canadian Girl series about the smallpox epidemic in Montreal in 1885)
Millie: Ride the River by Troon Harrison (Our Canadian Girl series about life in rural Ontario in 1914)
Mine for Keeps by Jean Little (novel about a girl with cerebral palsy in Ontario)
Northern Kids by Linda Goyette (short stories about the children of the Yukon, Northwest Territories, Nunavut, and remote regions of the western provinces)
No Safe Harbour (Dear Canada novel about the Halifax explosion in 1917)
Not a Nickel to Spare (Dear Canada novel about the Great Depression in 1932)
On the Case (Our Canadian Flyer novel about Mountie Sam Steele and the Ktunaxa people)
One Hundred Shining Candles by Janet Lunn (historical fiction about a pioneer girl in Upper Canada in 1800)
Orphan at My Door (Dear Canada novel about the home children in 1897)
Penelope by Sharon McKay (Our Canadian Girl series about three sisters in Halifax in 1917)
Pioneer Kids (Our Canadian Flyer novel about pioneers on the Canadian prairies in 1910)
Prairie Fire! by Bill Freeman (historical fiction about the Bains family homesteading in Portage la Prairie in the 1870s)
Prisoners in the Promised Land (Dear Canada novel about Ukrainian interment during World War I in 1914)
Rachel by Lynne Kositsky (Our Canadian Girl series about the Underground Railroad in 1783)
Rocky Mountain Kids by Linda Goyette (short stories about children in the Rockies from ancient times through present day)
Seed that Became a Garden: The Story of St. Marguerite Bourgeoys by Sr. Louise Finn (biography of a nun in New France)
Shantymen of Cache Lake
Sioux Winter by Bill Freeman (historical fiction about the Bains family in western Canada in the 1870s)
SOS Titanic! (Our Canadian Flyer novel about the Titanic sinking in 1912)
Stop that Stagecoach! (Our Canadian Flyer novel about Upper Canada in the 1830s)
Susanna Moodie: Roughing It In the Bush by Carol Shields and Patrick Crowe (graphic novel about an early Canadian pioneer woman and writer in the 1800s)
BONUS for moms: Sisters in the Wilderness by Charlotte Gray (a biography of Susanna Moodie and Catharine Parr Traill)
That Fatal Night (Dear Canada novel about the Titanic in 1912)
The Birchbark House by Louise Erdrich (historical fiction about a young Ojibwa girl living on an island in Lake Superior around 1847)
The Death of My Country (Dear Canada novel about the Plains of Abraham and the fall of New France in 1759)
The Hollow Tree by Janet Lunn (historical fiction about a girl during the American Revolution by an award-winning Canadian author)
The Last Safe House by Barbara Greenwood (fiction and nonfiction about the Underground Railroad between Virginia and St. Catharines, Ontario, in 1850)
The Peacemaker: Thanadelthur by David Alexander Robertson (graphic novel about Thanadelthur, an Aboriginal peacemaker between the Cree / Dene and the Hudson Bay Company)
The Root Cellar by Janet Lunn (historical fiction about the American Civil War by an award-winning Canadian author)
The Secret World of Og by Pierre Berton (fantasy about the adventures of the five Berton children in the secret caverns underneath their home)
These Are My Words (Dear Canada novel about residential schools in Ontario in 1966)
To Stand on My Own (Dear Canada novel about the polio epidemic in 1937)
Torn Apart (Dear Canada novel about Japanese internment in World War II in 1941)
Trail of Broken Dreams (Dear Canada novel about the Gold Rush in 1862)
Trouble at Lachine Mill by Bill Freeman (historical novel about the Bains family in Montreal in the 1870s)
Turned Away (Dear Canada novel about a Jewish family in World War II in 1942)
Vancouver Kids by Lesley McKnight (short stories about various Vancouver events from ancient times through present day in the eyes of a child at the time)
Viola Desmond Won’t Be Budged by Jody Nyasha Warner (based on the true story of Viola Desmond’s fight against racism in 1946)
Where the River Takes Me (Dear Canada novel about the Hudson’s Bay Company at Fort Victoria in 1849)
Whispers of War (Dear Canada novel about the War of 1812)
Wings to Fly by Celia Lottridge (historical fiction about a Canadian pioneer girl in 1918, compared to Little House on the Prairie)
Winter of Peril (Dear Canada novel about Newfoundland in 1721)
With Nothing But Our Courage (Dear Canada novel about British Loyalists in 1783)
Woman of the Paddle-Song by Elizabeth Clutton-Brock (historical fiction about explorer David Thompson’s wife Charlotte Small)
Yikes, Vikings! (Our Canadian Flyer novel about Lief Ericsson’s voyage to Vinland in 1001)
What books for Canadian tween girls would you recommend?
My thanks to Donna Ward of Northwoods Press for some of the ideas in this list. For more great Canadian history and geography resources, check out her website.
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