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Showing posts from January, 2012

Ken Dryden Talks The Game

CBC  presents Ken Dryden  and  The Game A  Canada Reads  event with  Homerun’s Sue Smith Thursday, February 2 at 7 PM At Indigo Bookstore ( 1500, avenue McGill College ) CBC Radio presents an evening with former Montreal Canadiens’ goalie,  Ken Dryden . Join us for an onstage conversation with the hockey legend as host  Sue Smith  speaks to him about  The Game , both then and now. Widely acknowledged as the best hockey book ever written,  The Game  is a reflective and thought-provoking look at a life in hockey. Intelligent and insightful, former Montreal Canadiens goalie and former President of the Toronto Maple Leafs, Ken Dryden captures the essence of the sport and what it means to all hockey fans. He gives us vivid and affectionate portraits of the characters — Guy Lafleur, Larry Robinson, Guy Lapointe, Serge Savard, and coach Scotty Bowman among them — that made the Canadiens of the 1970s one of the greatest hockey teams in history. But beyond that, Dryden reflects on life on the

The Code: A Novel By Gare Joyce

Gare Joyce's first novel is the first hockey book release of 2012.  Code, The , which comes under the pen name G.B. Joyce is a 352 page novel from Penguin Books. Buy The Book: Amazon.ca - Chapters . Here's the synopsis: For fans of Elmore Leonard and Robert B. Parker, meet hockey scout turned private detective Brad Shade, from “one of the best sports writers on the continent. Brad Shade has been just about everywhere hockey is played. He has ridden the buses in the minors, shared dressing rooms with the legends of the game, closed bars with guys destined for the Hall of Fame, and dropped the gloves with journeymen like himself who’ll never get near it. And even though he’s retired after fourteen years of bouncing around the league with more losses than wins and his net worth eroding, he’s still living out of a suitcase and still taking numbers. That’s his day job—scout for LA, where someone in management owes him a favour from his playing days. But when the bruta

The Whiskey Robber Set To Ride Again

The goalie known as  The Whiskey Robber is set to be freed  from Hungarian prison. Attila Ambrus, a former goalie who from 1994 to 1999 supplemented his meager income in the Hungarian professional ice hockey league by robbing banks, is set to be released from a jail in Satoraljujhely, Hungary on January 31. Known in his heisting heyday as the “Whiskey Robber”, Ambrus achieved folk-hero status by pulling off a string of 27 straight robberies of banks, travel agencies and post offices before he was caught on January 15, 1999. Ambrus, now 44, obtained his famous moniker because he was seen drinking a shot of whiskey at a pub near the site of each prospective caper. His sealed his fame by giving flowers to female tellers, sending bottles of wine to the police and by not harming anybody during his escapades. You may recognize the nickname from the widely popular book  Ballad of the Whiskey Robber  written by  Julian Rubinstein . Johnny Depp and Warner Brothers bought the movie rights

Kid Dynamite: The Gerry James Story

Gerry James, aka Kid Dynamite , was not only the youngest player ever to play in the CFL at 17, but he was one of the toughest athletes of his time. While playing with the Winnipeg Blue Bombers in 1954, James was the very first recipient of the CFL’s Schenley Most Outstanding Canadian Award. He won the award a second time in 1957. James led the league in scoring in 1957 and held the record for most rushing touchdowns in one season for forty-three years. He was on four Grey Cup winning teams. Along with his father, he holds the honour of being a member of the CFL Hall of Fame and the Manitoba Hall of Fame. Not only did James achieve greatness in football, but after winning a Memorial Cup with the Toronto Marlboros in 1955, he went on to play hockey for the Toronto Maple Leafs for four seasons. James is the only person to play in a Grey Cup and a Stanley Cup final in the same season. In the 1970s, after coaching in Davos, Switzerland, he embarked on a twenty year career as one of

The China Wall: The Timeless Legend of Johnny Bower

Johnny Bower, born as John Kishkan, in essence had two outstanding hockey careers: One "riding the bus" in the minor pro leagues for 13 years, and a second enjoying 11 full NHL seasons with the Toronto Maple Leafs. Bower and author Bob Duff tell the amazing story (and many more!) in the book The China Wall: The Timeless Legend of Johnny Bower Buy The Book: Amazon.ca  - Chapters - Amazon.com But before his hockey career had begun, Johnny almost lost his life and/or freedom in Europe due to World War II. At 15 he lied about his age in order to fight for his country. Johnny was supposed to be a part of the 1942 invasion of Normandy at the port of Dieppe. The 6000 man mission was simply disastrous as about 3400 men lost their lives or were seriously wounded and most of the rest were taken prisoner. "I'd been all set to go but a day or two before the raid, nine fellas in my company, including myself, got so sick with a respiratory infection, they had to take use