Our Game: An All-Star Collection of Hockey Fiction

Dave Jenkinson is a professor in the Faculty of Education at the University of Manitoba and the author of the “Portraits” section of Emergency Librarian.

Originally published as The Rocket, the Flower, the Hammer and Me in
1988, Our Game has increased in size from 20 to 30 pieces of fiction,
with each story relating in some way to Canada’s unofficial national
game, hockey. The collection has also been restructured and divided into
three parts: “Growing Up on Ice,” “Playing the Game,” and
“Fans and Philosophers.” Beardsley’s arrangement of the book’s
contents could be considered chronological: the first 10 stories deal
with our childhood attempts at the game, coupled with our dreams of
playing professionally; the second 11 advance to our playing days; and
the final nine find us musing about the game of hockey and its meaning
to us as individuals and as a nation.

The collection begins with what is probably Canada’s best-known piece
of hockey fiction: Roch Carrier’s “The Hockey Sweater.” The
increased participation of females in all aspects of hockey is
acknowledged through the addition of three women authors and through
Marsha Mildon’s “Number 33,” an engaging story about a woman who,
at age 49, transforms herself from an avid fan into a neophyte player.
If the collection has a weakness, it is that 11 of the pieces are
extracts from books; not surprisingly, some of these “stories” lack
a sense of closure. On the positive side, exposure to extracts from such
works as Roy MacGregor’s The Last Season or Hugh MacLennan’s Two
Solitudes may inspire readers to seek out the full texts.

Most of the selections are about hockey when it truly was “our
game”—before it migrated to such unlikely places as Nashville and
Tampa Bay. Consequently, Our Game will probably appeal most strongly to
adult readers who fondly recall the “Original Six” or the teams that
followed in the first wave of expansion.