Comedian Dave Hill hits the ice in ‘The Awesome Game’ | Book Talk
In his 2019 book “Parking the Moose: One American’s Epic Quest to Discover His Incredible Canadian Roots,” Cleveland-born comedian Dave Hill recalls his Canadian grandfather taking him to the ice rink and asking, “What good are you if you can’t skate?”
In “The Awesome Game: One Man’s Incredible, Globe-Crushing Hockey Odyssey,” Hill’s lifelong enthusiasm deepens to comic obsession. When he learns that a distant relative plays for two teams in Katowice, Poland, a city about the size of Toledo, he makes contact on social media, heads off to Katowice and is almost arrested for jaywalking as soon as he leaves his hotel.
Hill joined a Cleveland Heights league when he was 11 and later began playing for St. Ignatius High School in Cleveland. Here he begins to evaluate hockey jerseys, rating them largely on the ferocity of the mascot depicted. He sneers at the Anaheim Ducks for their duck footprint and winces at the Arizona Coyotes, “with a logo that looks like what Picasso might have up with if he were opening a Tex-Mex restaurant in a strip mall outside of Tucson.”
A savage beast with blood dripping from its slavering jaws might be more to his liking, as are the European jerseys he acquires on sight, gloating that by buying them in person he is saving the shipping fees.
There is only one hockey team in Kenya, so naturally Hill had to fly to Nairobi to play with the Ice Lions. Unfortunately, the team’s facility was closed because of the pandemic, so he had to play roller hockey in a parking lot. He did, of course, buy a jersey.
Though “The Awesome Game” is consistently funny, with Hill’s usual blustering sincerity, he finally gets to the issue that’s been troubling him: Why isn’t hockey more popular in the United States? He chats with players including a former Cleveland Barons player, Stanley Cup winners and several prominent coaches. He calls Moscow to conduct a Zoom interview with a member of the Soviet team defeated in the “Miracle on Ice” at the 1980 Lake Placid Olympics. The consensus is discouraging.
As entertaining as “The Awesome Game” is, it has a real poignancy. Hill is a gifted storyteller and the book has interest far beyond that of hockey lovers. “The Awesome Game” (259 pages, hardcover) costs $28 from Triumph Books.
‘Dance Naked With God’
In the 2000 book “If There’s No Heaven,” Tallmadge poet Barbara Marie Minney explored uncertainty, loneliness, yearning and self-realization of gender transition, saying that the poems reflected the “first two years of [her] life as a woman after repressing [her] true gender identity for over 60 years.”
In her new collection “Dance Naked with God,” Minney expands her range to include love and companionship, forgiveness and recovery. A marriage survives alcoholism; in “Depression Poem #3,” words in the medical examiner’s report on the death of Jayland Walker are blacked out but do not lose their power.
“Persons Unknown” is in recognition of Rita Hester, a transgender woman who was murdered in 1998, partially inspiring Transgender Day of Remembrance, which is Nov. 20.
“Dance Naked with God” (37 pages) costs $10 (from the micropress Rusty McRustBeltFace; email flamingowritersguild@gmail.com. Some of the poems appeared in other publications. Minney is a retired attorney.
‘The Details Will Be Gone Soon’
“The Details Will Be Gone Soon” by Jeremy Jusek, poet laureate of Parma, illuminates the anguish of loving a person with Alzheimer’s disease.
Jusek’s loved one is his grandmother, but the characteristics of the disease will be familiar to anyone who has been touched by it. In “Endless Soup,” Nana dictates the recipe so it can be preserved, but it just won’t be the same. “I just wish she’d make it again.”
Nana forgets so much but remembers things at random. She becomes agitated and confused as her grandson tries to fix his memories of her in his mind. She forgets her grandson’s name while she is making bread, for which she doesn’t need a recipe.
“Three Things to Know About Nana” is a worthy tribute, as “Nana was a lark / a park / a sassy matriarch ... at the break of day arising, she now spins hymns at Heaven’s gate ... skilled in spoon and satire, spiritually strong.”
“The Details Will Be Gone Soon” (65 pages, softcover) costs $18 from elj-edtions.com. Some of the poems appeared in other publications.
Events
Fireside Books (29 N. Franklin St., Chagrin Falls): Pamela McColl signs “’Twas the Night: The Art and History of the Classic Christmas Poem,” featured Oct. 10 in Book Talk, 1 to 3 p.m. Sunday.
Wadsworth Public Library (132 Broad St.): William D. Horton talks about “The Alcohol & Addiction Solution!”), 7 to 9 p.m. Monday.
Mandel Jewish Community Center (26001 S. Woodland Road, Beachwood): Michael Oren, former Israeli ambassador to the United States and author of “Swann’s War” and “Six Days of War: June 1967 and the Making of the Modern Middle East,” is the keynote speaker for the Cleveland Jewish Book Festival, 7:30 p.m. Monday. Tickets are $18; go to mandeljcc.org/bookfest.
Loganberry Books (13015 Larchmere Blvd., Shaker Heights): As part of the Larchmere Holiday Stroll, local authors will sign their books: On Friday at 11 a.m. Miesha W. Headen (“Cleveland Noir” editor,) 2 p.m., Tobias Buckell (fantasy “A Stranger in the Citadel,”), 3:30 p.m. Amaras and Paul Driggere (fantasy “Shadows in Light”). Saturday at 11 a.m. Sarah Lohman (“Endangered Eating: America’s Vanishing Foods,”) 12:30 p.m. Annie Zaleski (“This Is Christmas, Song by Song,”) 2 p.m. Angie Hoffman (romance novel “Shipped,”) 3 p.m. Carlo Wolff (“Invisible Soul: The Unsung History of Cleveland’s Bygone Soul Scene,”) 4:30 p.m. Brandi Larsen (memoir “Uncultured.”) At noon Sunday, Jennifer Boresz Engelking (“Lost Lake Erie,”) 1 p.m. David Giffels “The Beginning Was the End: Devo in Ohio,”) 2:30 p.m. Tony Marini (“Pennie the Christmas Pickle.”)
Visible Voice Books (2258 Professor Ave., Cleveland): Joe Markko signs “Genesis of a Genre: The Birth of Christian Rock,” 7 p.m. Saturday.
Email information about books of local interest, and event notices at least two weeks in advance to BeaconBookTalk@gmail.com and bjnews@thebeaconjournal.com. Barbara McInyre tweets at @BarbaraMcI.
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This article originally appeared on Akron Beacon Journal: Comedian Dave Hill hits the ice in ‘The Awesome Game’ | Book Talk
