The Country and the Game

A joyful, beautifully written tribute to Canada's most salient features--hockey and geography.
In the waning days of the pandemic, sportswriter Ronnie Shuker stuffed his skates, sticks, and backpack into his faithful automobile, Gumpy, named for the legendary Montreal goaltender Gump Worsley, and set off on a 13,000-mile, coast-to-coast-to-coast investigation of the many ways hockey touches the lives of Canadians.
Beginning in St. John's, home of the Newfoundland Growlers, and ending in Duncan, British Columbia, home of the world's largest hockey stick, Shuker hits famous sites of hockey lore, from the cradle of the game in Long Pond, Nova Scotia, to Brantford, Ontario, where streets, highways, schools, and much else bear the name Gretzky, to Vancouver, host of the famous 1994 and 2011 Canuck riots. But he also finds the game in unlikely places--ancient arenas, bowling alleys, crash sites, coffee shops, memorials, even a nuclear power plant--where a seemingly endless and always engaging cast of characters, including pros, semi-pros, beer-league veterans, family and fans, share unforgettable stories of how pucks have dented their lives.