5 Canadian books make shortlist for $75K Hilary Weston Writers' Trust Prize for nonfiction

phoebe canadian river books feature made the shortlist for the 2025 Hilary edward weston Writers' cartel Prize for nonfiction.

The $75,000 award recognizes the best Canadian nonfiction book of the year. It is the largest prize for nonfiction in Canada. 

The shortlisted books are One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This by Omar El Akkad, The Snag by Tessa McWatt, The Migrant Rain Falls in Reverse by Vinh Nguyen, Theory of Water by Leanne Betasamosake Simpson and A Truce That Is Not Peace by Miriam Toews. 

The books range in subject from grappling with with grief as a loved ones' dementia advances to tracing the historical and cultural connections of Indigenous peoples to water. They were chosen from 101 titles by Canadian writers Matthew R. Morris, Lorri Neilsen Glenn and Niigaan Sinclair. 

The shortlisted titles are available in accessible formats through the Centre of Equitable Library Access. 

Past winners include Martha Baillie in 2024 for There is No Blue and Christina Sharpe in 2023 for Ordinary Notes.

The Writers' Trust of Canada is an organization that supports Canadian writers through literary awards, fellowships, financial grants, mentorships and more. 

It also gives out 11 prizes in recognition of the year's best in fiction, nonfiction and short story, as well as mid-career and lifetime achievement awards.

The winner of the Hilary Weston Prize for nonfiction will be announced at the Writers' Trust awards gala on Nov. 13 in Toronto. 

Get to know the 2025 finalists and their books below.

On Oct. 25, 2023, after Israel bombed Gaza following the Oct. 7 attacks, Egyptian Canadian journalist Omar El Akkad posted a statement on social media: "One day, when it's safe, when there's no personal downside to calling a thing what it is, when it's too late to hold anyone accountable, everyone will have always been against this."

His book One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This expands on his powerful social media message and chronicles his thoughts on the fragile nature of truth, justice, privilege and morality.

"One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This is an act of public service that compels us to grapple with the conflict in Gaza with artful urgency," said the jury in a press statement.

"Writing with an elegant blend of emotional clarity and intellectual layering, El Akkad takes a bold stance on the conduits of historical memory and moral posturing and fearlessly lays out what is at stake if we fail to acknowledge we are all witnesses."

El Akkad is a journalist and author who currently lives in Portland, Ore. His novel American War was defended on Canada Reads 2018 by actor Tahmoh Penikett. He also wrote the novel  What Strange Paradise, which won the 2021 Scotiabank Giller Prize and was defended on Canada Reads 2022 by Tareq Hadhad.

In The Snag, Tessa McWatt wrote about confronting grief when her mother's dementia progressed and she could no longer live independently. This led McWatt to a forest, where she discovered that from the youngest seedling to the oldest snag in the forest, every stage of a tree's life holds meaning — finding solace in the natural world as a source of healing and understanding.

"The Snag is a beautiful exploration of love, grief, and the fragile ties that hold families together while also keeping them at a distance," said the jury.

"With incredible detail and sharp emotional insight, McWatt crafts a story that is both intimate and universal, guiding readers through the complexities of memory, belonging, and loss alongside an environment in crisis."

McWatt is the author of several novels and two books for young readers. She wrote the memoir Shame on Me, which won the 2020 Bocas Prize for Non-Fiction and was shortlisted for the Hilary Weston Prize. Her work has been nominated for Governor General's Literary Awards and the Toronto Book Awards. McWatt is a creative writing professor at the University of East Anglia. Originally from Guyana, she grew up in Canada and now lives in London, England.

In his memoir, The Migrant Rain Falls in Reverse, Vinh Nguyen retraces his family's journey from post-war Vietnam to Canada — and how this moment in history resonates with experiences in the diaspora today. The work is a genre-bending mix of real-life experiences, meticulous research and inventive history to explore the nature of family, immigration and identity.

"The Migrant Rain Falls in Reverse is an arresting and lyrical memoir that deftly weaves together memory, longing, and speculative invention into a deeply human exploration of identity," said the jury.

"Grounded in the mystery of an absent father, Nguyen takes readers on a profound journey through family, land, and loss, navigating shimmering distortions of thought and real-life struggle."

Nguyen is a Toronto-based writer, editor and educator whose work has been published in Brick, Literary Hub and The Malahat Review. He is a nonfiction editor at The New Quarterly, where he curates an ongoing series on refugee, migrant and diasporic writing. He was shortlisted for a National Magazine Award and won the John Charles Polanyi Prize for Literature. In 2022, he was a Lambda Literary nonfiction fellow. The Migrant Rain Falls in Reverse is also shortlisted for the 2025 Toronto Book Award. 

In Theory of Water, Leanne Betasamosake Simpson discovers and traces the historical and cultural interactions of Indigenous peoples with water in all its forms. She presents water as a catalyst for radical transformation and shows how it has the potential to heal and reshape the world in response to environmental and social injustice. 

"In her radical exploration of water, Simpson topples anthropocentrism and conventional ontologies to reveal water in all its forms as a powerful decolonizing force that connects us all," said the jury.

"Simpson's brilliant and sintering weave of story, research, and Nishnaabeg teachings in Theory of Water offers a generous and transformative perspective on world-building."

Simpson is a Michi Saagiig Nishnaabeg scholar, activist, musician, artist, author and member of Alderville First Nation. Her books include Islands of Decolonial Love, This Accident of Being Lost, which was shortlisted for the Rogers Writer's Trust Fiction Prize and the Trillium Book Award, Noopiming: The Cure for White Ladies, which was shortlisted for the Governor General's Literary Award for fiction and the Dublin Literary Prize, and Rehearsals for Living, a collaboration with Robyn Maynard, which was shortlisted for the Governor General's Literary Award for nonfiction.

In the memoir A Truce That is Not Peace, award-winning author Miriam Toews answers the question "why do you write?" in preparation for a literary event in Mexico City. As she thinks the question over, she unearths new layers of grief and helplessness surrounding her sister's suicide, which happened over 15 years ago — and realizes that one of her reasons for writing is to fill the gaping silence her sister left behind.

"Years after the suicides of both her father and her sister, Toews writes into the silence to create an engrossing maze of associative fragments that grapple with the extraordinary in the everyday," said the jury.

"Invited to respond to the question, 'Why do I write?' for a writers' event, Toews can't produce what the committee wants. Since both silence and words are failures, the question Toews explores may as well be: 'Why do you live?'"

Toews is the author of several books, including A Complicated Kindness, Fight Night and Summer of My Amazing Luck. Her work has earned numerous awards, including the Governor General's Literary Award for fiction, the Writers' Trust Engel Findley Award and the Atwood Gibson Writers' Trust Fiction Prize. Toews' book Women Talking was adapted into an Academy-award winning film directed by Sarah Polley. She was also appointed to the Order of Canada in 2025.

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