TBC: The Country And The Game

Having spent some time on the road in hotel rooms with some rather terrible television options, I knew I was going to need some way of filling time on days where I had nothing planned in the evenings. No offence to those hotels who employ some sort of RokuTV or whatever, but "live TV" isn't really live television when I'm trying to find sports to watch. That fact aside, I was smart enough to bring along a book that I was excitied to review as it looked like a great read about a pilgrammage across Canada for hockey! Today, Teebz's Book Club is proud to review The Country and the Game: 30,000 Miles of Hockey Stories, written by Ronnie Shukar and published by Sutherland House in Toronto. For a guy on a road trip watching hockey, this book felt like the perfect companion on my trip as Shukar made the longest of road trips to tap into the local hockey scenes in a number of communities across Canada!

I'm not sure how many authors have their own website, but, from his own website's biography, "Ronnie Shuker is an author, editor, freelance writer, and an editor at large for The Hockey News. He has traveled to places like North Korea, Chernobyl, Transnistria, and the Himalayas, where he took part in the Guinness World Record for the highest altitude hockey game ever played. He lives in the Greater Toronto Area and plays pickup hockey north of the city." Some of his work for The Hockey News included pieces like The Life of Rielly, Discovering Barilko, and The Lost Summit while I note that he's a lifelong Toronto Maple Leafs fan (don't hold that against him). His book, The Country and the Game: 30,000 Miles of Hockey Stories, is the first book he's penned after finding a very rewarding career writing about hockey.

I'll admit that I had no idea what communities would see Ronnie Shukar visit when I first cracked the spine on The Country and the Game, but I have to admit that I was into the book from the opening pages of him being in the Maritimes and Newfoundland almost immediately. From the two Terry Ryans (Senior and Junior) to playing in towns and cities across Newfoundland and Labrador to stopping in the French territory of Saint-Pierre and Miquelon where Shukar wrote an incredible section about the two teams that play there, this book will drop you into locations that seem foreign despite mostly everyone living under the Maple Leaf flag.

The Country and the Game is an incredible look at the cultures across Canada in each province and the peoples who inhabit those communities, what they endure in their daily lives, and how hockey brings us all together despite people gathering and being from different walks of life. Hearing how some players in Quebec consider themselves more Quebecois than Canadian, learning that the communities surrounding James Bay may be the most passionate hockey people there are, and reading about life in Canada's north and the struggles and accomplishments they experience with life and hockey was eye-opening to me as my city-dwelling life has certainly given me am perspective on the game different than those peoples.

While Shukar likely didn't intend to write a culturally-impactful book, hockey is undeniably Canadian in its roots and within its culture. Understanding that hockey is life in towns like Flin Flon, Manitoba and how the costs of the game are a fight each and every year for players to be on the ice in Rankin Inlet, Nunavut is something we can all likely admit is true. What we forget is how important hockey arenas are to small communities as not only places to play hockey, but as meeting centers for communities to get together, share stories, and bond over the game. Reading that Masset, BC doesn't have a hockey rink despite neighbouring communities having them and Masset trying to raise funds to build one goes to show the importance that they play in communities across Canada.

In saying that, there was one passage in the book that stood out to me as I read it based on what Shukar was documenting in The Country and the Game. It reads,

"That is the main difference between hockey in big cities and the game in small towns. In urban areas, hockey is too often a schedule slapped on the refrigerator, or an NHL pipe dream that parents push upon their kids. In places like Rankin Inlet, Labrador, Eeyou Istchee, and the Cree communities around James Bay, the game is part of the cycle of life, seamless and fluid, with the entire town pulling in the same direction."

Whether were talking about Floral, Saskatchewan or Parry Sound, Ontario or Cole Harbour, Nova Scotia, Shukar has eloquently identified the difference between playing hockey and living hockey. The small-town approach that a lot of the small communities have sees everyone involved in the game at some level to not only make it better, but to make life better. That's a significant thing when one considers the importance of hockey to these communities, and The Country and the Game captures that essense so well!

As I wrote in my review of My New Hero, "[f]ar too often, there are great stories out there that take place from a fan's perspective that we never hear", and The Country and the Game does capture some of that. Where this book excels, though, is reading the experiences that Shukar captures in his writing about what hockey means to each community and the people in those communities. The organic joie de vivre when it comes to hockey isn't hard to find among the many people who spoke Shukar, and hockey in urban settings could really use a heavy dose of that persepctive.

Overall, The Country and the Game was a very enjoyable read that kept me engaged as Shukar and his passengers moved across the Canadian landscape. As written above, I enjoyed the looks at how hockey affected each of the communities in which he stopped, and the book offered some real perspective on the importance of the game not only in a sporting sense, but in a life sense as well on its 236 pages. There is no doubt that Ronnie Shukar has written a great book, making it easy to give The Country and the Game: 30,000 Miles of Hockey Stories the Teebz's Book Club Seal of Approval!

The Country and the Game: 30,000 Miles of Hockey Stories was released on October 15, 2024, and it can be found in all major bookstores. The material contained within the covers is pretty easy to read, but there are instances of foul language in the book. The chapters are laid out well with breaks within each chapter, so this book would be suitable for older teens and adults based on the instances of language and the subject matter. If you're looking for a great hockey book for your hockey fan this holiday season or beyond, I highly recommend picking up The Country and the Game: 30,000 Miles of Hockey Stories by Ronnie Shukar!

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!