2012 Hockey Books

A look at the upcoming 2012 hockey book releases:

1972 Summit Series: The Untold Story
Angela James: First Superstar of Women's Hockey
A Season In Time by Todd Denault
A Wild Stab For It by Dave Bidini
Barry Melrose: Dropping The Gloves
Battle On The Hudson
Bernie Parent: Unmasked
The Best Of Down Goes Brown
Best Seat In The House by Jamie McLennan
Brass Bonanza Plays Again
Breakaway: Untold Stories of Hockey's Great Escapes
Captain James T. Sutherland: Battle for HHOF
Chicken Soup For The Soul: Hooked On Hockey
Coach: The Pat Burns Story
Concussed! - Keith Primeau and Kerry Goulet
Crosby's Golden Goal by Mike Leonetti
Derek Sanderson: Crossing The Line with Kevin Shea
Dit: Dit Clapper and the Rise of the Boston Bruins
Empire Of Ice: Rise and Fall of PCHA
Flyers Lives by Jakki Clarke
The Goal That United Canada: 72 Amazing Stories
Gold Mine To Gold Medal by Ivan McLelland
Hockey Hall of Fame: Book of Jerseys
Hockey Night In Canada: 60 Seasons
Hockey Now!
"Hockey Smut"
Hockeytown Doc
The Instigator: (Gary Bettman Bio)
Journeyman by Sean Pronger
J.R. by Jeremy Roenick
La Coupe A Quebec (Quebec Bulldogs)
Leave No Doubt by Mike Babcock
Long Shots: Maritime Hockey
Original Six Dynasties: Detroit Red Wings
Marcel Pronovost: A Life In Hockey
Next Goal Wins! by Liam Maguire
Paul Henderson: The Goal Of My Life
Red Rising: The Washington Capitals Story
Refereeing Identity: Cultural Work of Canadian Hockey Novels
Reflections 2012: NHL Hockey Year in Photographs
Selling The Dream by Ken Campbell and Jim Parcels
Sports Illustrated: The Great One
Stanley Cup: 120 Years of Hockey Supremacy
Stickhandling Through The Margins: First Nations Hockey
Straight Shooter: The Brad Park Story
Sudden Death: 1986 Swift Current Broncos
Tales From The Locker Room
Team Canada '72
The Hockey News Top Ten
This Sweater Is For You
Titans of '72 - Mike Leonetti
Wearing The "C" by Ross Bernstein
Year of the Los Angeles Kings

Young Adult
Accidentally On Purpose
Rookie by Lorna Schultz Nicholson

Children's Books
Adirondack Kids: The Pond Hockey Challenge
Hockey Canada: Learn All About Hockey Coloring and Activity Book
H Is For Hockey: NHL Alumni Alphabet
Hockey Superstars 2012-13
Marshall Plays Hockey
The Puck Hog 2
Over At The Rink: A Hockey Counting Book
Puckster (two titles)

Foreign Books
37 Stories About Karlis - Latvia

Papers
Prague Winter 1933 by Roger Godin

Bidini Book Due Out In 2013

From Dave Bidini's literary agent:

Canada Reads and Toronto Book Awards finalist, National Post columnist and Bidiniband frontman, Dave Bidini's KEON AND ME: MY SEARCH FOR THE LOST SOUL OF THE LEAFS, a memoir of the writer at 11 as well as a search for his childhood sporting hero, Canada English rights to Associate Publisher of Penguin Canada Nick Garrison for Fall 2013 by Samantha Haywood.

Here's the full press release

Hockey Night In Canada: 60 Seasons by Michael McKinley

Before Twitter, before 24-hour sports channels, long before fans watched highlight goals on their phones—long before something called a “highlight” had been invented—there was Hockey Night in Canada. It was cutting-edge technology back then. Anywhere in Canada, a hockey fan could come in from the snow, sit down by the radio, listen to a game played in Montreal or Toronto, and experience the thrill of a game played hundreds, or thousands, of kilometres away. Before all of what we call Canada had joined Confederation, even before the “Original Six,” there was Hockey Night in Canada to define both the country and the game.

Then, sixty years ago, another technological marvel changed the game—and the country—and launched the longest-running program in the world. CBC’s Hockey Night in Canada, for the first time, was on television.

At first fans worried that television would ruin the game. Now Canadians can hardly imagine the game without the CBC broadcast. 

Hockey Night in Canada: 60 Seasons  celebrates the moments, the personalities, and the innovations that have shaped our experience of the game.

What would hockey be without instant replay or the “three stars”? What would it be without Foster Hewitt, Howie Meeker, Peter Puck, or mythical moments like Bobby Orr’s Stanley Cup–winning goal? What would the game be without the Saturday night double-header, or Coach’s Corner, or Bob Cole’s “Stand up and cheer, Canada!” at the 2002 Olympics? Hockey Night in Canada: 60 Seasons celebrates not only what is great about the game, but how Hockey Night in Canada has come to define it.

Written by Michael McKinley, author of Hockey: A People’s History, with a foreword by Ron MacLean and richly illustrated with rare on-screen and archival material, Hockey Night in Canada: 60 Seasons features behind-the-scenes glimpses into the way the broadcast was born and developed and little-known stories about the men and women who have brought our game to life in sixty fascinating moments.

Buy The Book: Amazon.ca - Chapters - Amazon.com

Bobby Orr Autobiography Coming in 2013

From Quill and Quire:

Hockey legend Bobby Orr will commit his life to paper in an autobiography that explores both his sports career and personal life.Orr: My Story will be published by Penguin Canada’s Viking imprint in October.

In a press release, Orr is quoted as saying:

I’m like most people in that over time I’ve wanted to write down my thoughts, make sense of many things I’ve seen, and share some things I’ve learned. Having played in the National Hockey League doesn’t make me a better person than anyone else but it does mean that I’ve met some interesting people and been through some experiences I think are worth putting on paper. This moment in my life seems the right time to do just that.

Orr: My Story was acquired by Penguin Canada associate publisher Nick Garrison and will be published simultaneously in the U.S. by Penguin’s G.P. Putnam’s Sons imprint.

Here's the full story.

Please note: the above cover image is not the cover image for this upcoming release. It is from a book published in 1973.

Long Shots: The Maritime Teams That Played for the Stanley Cup

Guest book review by Ryan Van Horne

Although he never played the game, it could be argued that Frederick Arthur Stanley is hockey's greatest legend – or at least responsible for it.

He is the man who started the sport's greatest tradition by donating the Dominion Hockey Challenge Cup.
Stanley's official title was Lord Stanley of Preston and, as the Governor General of Canada in 1892, he plunked down $48.67 of his own money to purchase a trophy that would become the most cherished in all of sport.

In the early years, it was a true challenge cup and 57 teams from coast to coast played for it. A team from Dawson City, Yukon made a month-long trek to Ottawa and even travelled by sled-dog for part of the journey.

Long Shots: The Curious Story of the Four Maritime Teams That Played for the Stanley Cup was published in October. It explores the history of the Sydney Millionaires and three other Maritime teams that challenged for the Cup.

Nowadays, three of the four cities are represented by major junior teams and the fourth hosts a junior A team. But 100 years ago, there was a Maritime Professional Hockey League and any team could issue a challenge to the defending champion and, if the trustees thought they were worthy, they would arrange a two-game, total-goal series.

Long Shots is the third book by Halifax author Trevor Adams. In researching it, he mucked around in the corners of Maritime hockey lore and came out with the previously unpublished memoirs of Alfred (Cap) McDonald, the captain of the 1912-13 Sydney Millionaires team that challenged the defending Quebec Bulldogs featuring legendary scoring machine Joe Malone.

The other Maritime teams to challenge for the Stanley Cup preceded the Millionaires. They were the Halifax Crescents, the New Glasgow Cubs and the Moncton Victorias. All lost by lopsided scores and no Maritime team played for the Cup after the Millionaires.

Adams explores the early days of professional hockey before the formation of the National Hockey League. From McDonald's memoirs, Adams is able to paint a portrait we rarely see today because it is difficult to interview an athlete and get beyond the cliche.

“He talks about the struggles he went through coming up through professional hockey; playing games and not getting paid and having to work as lumberjack in the offseason because hockey players weren't making any better money than any other sort of blue-collar workers,” Adams said. “They are really sort of authentic, playing mostly playing out of community pride more than anything else.”

Marshall Plays Hockey

Do you ever wonder what happens on the frozen sloughs and ponds at night, long after all the children are tucked in their beds and dreaming of hockey? Well Marshall the Moose comes out and plays hockey. No, it's true. And yes he wears a helmet - it's made of bark and moss. He uses a rock as a puck.

Marshall convinces some of his friends to play too. Friends who just happen to include a bear, a deer, a beaver and a Canada goose.

No there's no locking out the moonlit Forest Hockey League. Anything is possible there. And that's the message behind sisters Lisa VandeVelde and Erin Black's cute new book Marshall Plays Hockey. It's a hockey book for pre-schoolers. Hey, what Canadian pre-schoolers wouldn't love a book about hockey and distinctly Canadian animals!

“A lot of books out there on hockey are for older kids. Lots of them are wordy. I wanted a good story that captured Canada’s passion for hockey that a young child could relate to,” said author VanderVelde to the Vernon Morning Star.

Black, who actually lives in New Zealand, illustrated the book brilliantly. It's eye-catching an

The book can be found locally in Vernon, British Columbia and Renfrew, Ontario. The rest of us can order the book at http://marshallthemoose.blogspot.ca/. The book costs $15.99 in Canada. Bulk order discounts and international orders are also available.

X-Reay Tactician: Billy Reay's Hockey Tales

From Doug Moe of The Wisconsin State Journal

Storytelling must run in the family. Bill’s father, Billy Reay, was a natural. Nobody spun better tales around the big breakfast table at the Coventry Village senior community off High Point Road. It was Billy Reay’s last residence. Mornings, he held court while the guys drank coffee.

Reay — who died in Madison in 2004, at 86 — had a deep well of stories that sprang in part from his many years as a player and coach in the rough-and-tumble National Hockey League. As a player, Reay helped the Montreal Canadians win two Stanley Cups. As a coach, he took the Chicago Blackhawks to three Stanley Cup finals.

It was Reay’s legendary hockey career that led the publishers of the “Chicken Soup for the Soul” books to contact his son, Bill, in Madison earlier this year and ask for a contribution to the latest in the series, just published, titled “Hooked on Hockey: 101 Stories About the Players Who Love the Game and the Families that Cheer Them On.”

Read the full story.