Mind Over Matter: Hard Won Battles On The Road To Hope by Jordin Tootoo and Stephen Brunt

If you are looking for the more typical hockey biography with stories of hockey heroics and hijinx, this is not your book. But you're in luck. Jordin Tootoo already wrote that book - All The Way: My Life On Ice. And you probably should read that book first, anyway, to get a better understanding of who Jordin Tootoo is. 

Then you should come to his second book, Mind Over Matter. It is not really a sequel. In essence this book is Jordin Tootoo himself trying to get a better understanding of who Jordin Tootoo is.

Hockey is the framework through which Tootoo explores far bigger stories about family, addiction, Indigenous identity, trauma and healing. 

Tootoo became famous as the first Inuk player in the NHL, and his NHL career is certainly front and center of his story. But this isn't a hockey memoir - in fact there is comparatively little hockey detail at all in this book. 

Tootoo attempts to understand his family history. His father was a survivor of residential school, and Tootoo gradually comes to understand how that trauma, alcoholism, violence and silence were passed from one generation to the next. The discovery of unmarked graves at residential schools becomes a catalyst for him to look backward and try to understand things in his own family that had never really been discussed. That gives the book considerably more weight than the conventional sports memoir.

Then there is Tootoo's own alcoholism and recovery. He seems to openly come to grips with the damage he himself caused, the people he hurt, the apologies he had to make, and the uncomfortable process of taking responsibility after getting sober. That self-accountability is one of the book's strongest qualities. 

And then there is the larger question of what it means to be an Indigenous man who grew up in Nunavut, made it into the NHL, became enormously successful, and still carried all of this unresolved baggage with him. 

Tootoo does not hide in this book. He clearly isn't trying to make himself look good. He comes across as angry and confused and self critical and flawed. He is completely genuine and, as hard as some of the topics are, that makes this book hard to put down. 

He is taking responsibility for everything that has happened in his life. He explores to understand where his problems came from but holds himself accountable to deal with the fall out. It is compelling and therefore very meaningful. It is a good message for everyone.

If you're looking for a straight up hockey book, go with Jordin Tootoo's All The Way. If you're looking for something much deeper and important, go with Mind Over Matter.