Product Description

This book probes for answers to how one of hockey's greatest players could also lead one of the most tragic and mysterious personal lives. Chris Robinson juxtaposes these investigations with his own beginnings as a troubled youth who found relief in the cardboard identities put forth by hockey cards and by his own identity as a street-hockey hotshot. Another means of escape for both men became alcohol, a facet of hockey culture thoroughly examined by Robinson's sceptical eye. Informing everything is Robinson's scrappy-yet-meditative, harsh yet humorous thoughts on a game that so many love to hate, or hate to love.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2838280 in Books
• Published on: 2005-10-01
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 160 pages

Review
"Puck lit (books about hockey) thrives in Canada, but a lot of hockey books are fluffy and overly nostalgic. Few bite with much honesty, and few are very critical of big-league hockey in particular. Bill Gaston's "Midnight Hockey" and local lad Chris Robinson's "Stole This from a Hockey Card" break from the tradition. Both are rock-solid books... "Stole This from a Hockey Card"is part biography of Doug Harvey, part autobiography of Chris Robinson, part hockey critique, part dissection of human weaknesses, and partly an examination of how alcohol keeps us together while having the potential to shatter us completely. Balancing it and merging it all in one smart and snappy book is Robinson's coup."
-- Matthew Firth, "Ottawa XPress"