- 1992 Finalist for The Trillium Book Award
- 1992 Winner of The Torgi Award
- 1992 Winner of Canadian Fiction magazine’s Annual Contributor’s Prize
- 1992 Chosen by Quill and Quire as one of Canada’s Best Ten Young Canadian Novelists
- 1995 Shortlisted for The Scotia Bank Giller Prize
- 1995 Shortlisted for The Governor General’s Award for Fiction
- 1995 Finalist for The Trillium Book Award
- 1996 Recipient of The Marian Engel Award
- 1998 Shortlisted for The Scotia Bank Giller Prize
- 1998 Shortlisted for The Governor General’s Award for Fiction
- 1998 Shortlisted for The Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize
- 1998 Finalist for The Trillium Book Award
- 2002 Best Toronto Author (2nd to Margaret Atwood) in NOW magazine’s poll of 300,000 readers
- 2003 Longlisted for The Man Booker Prize
- 2003 Shortlisted for The Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize
- 2003 Finalist for The Trillium Book Award
- 2005 Named by Ben Marcus of Harper’s magazine as being one of a few “terrific” literary realists who have “pounded on the emotional possibilities of their mode, refusing to subscribe to worn-out techniques and storytelling methods”
- 2007 Appointed to the Order of Canada
- 2007 Longlisted for The Scotia Bank Giller Prize
- 2007 Shortlisted for The Governor General’s Award for Fiction
- 2008 Finalist for The Toronto Book Award
- 2008 Winner of The Trillium Book Award
- 2012 Awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship