Don Cherry's Hockey Stories and Stuff
Don Cherry’s Hockey Stories and Stuff by Don Cherry
[
My review
](http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/54883324)rating: 5 of 5 stars
Don Cherry’s Hockey Stories and Stuff was a pleasant surprise. I’ve always enjoyed Cherry’s commentary on Hockey Night In Canada, but I’ve also thought that he was a bit of a meathead. He’s funny, somewhat insightful, a full-on Canadian redneck that loves being a redneck. When you look at the cover of the book, you get the feeling that it will somehow be the print version of his Rock ’em Sock ’em Greatest Hits video series. Instead, what you find inside is something completely different and the cover is very misleading and doesn’t do the book justice.
The book is simply an unordered compilations of stories from Cherry, written exactly how he would tell it. There is no attempt to “correct” the grammar that Cherry uses. This turns out to be a brilliant idea, because Cherry is one of hockey’s greatest story tellers and there’s no better way to hear the story being told. The stories encompass all aspects of Cherry’s life in hockey: his AHL career, NHL coaching career, life on tv and the CBC, his dog, his dad. While reading the book it is obvious that Cherry loves the hard hitting and brutal side of hockey, but what really struck me was just how much of a humanist Cherry is. The book is in perfect sync with the fallen soldier memorials that Cherry has at the end of his show on HNIC. There are many great stories in the book, such as coaching a Bruins team with Bobby Orr and Brad park, or getting in a fight and almost having his thumb bit off. What really sets the book apart though is how it shows Cherry’s understanding of compassion and kindness.
