NATIONAL BESTSELLER
A new book by Hall of Fame goalie and bestselling author Ken Dryden
celebrates the 50th anniversary of the 1972 Summit Series
SEPTEMBER 2, 1972, MONTREAL FORUM, GAME ONE:
The best against the best for the first time. Canada, the country that
had created the game; the Soviet Union, having taken it up only
twenty-six years earlier. On the line: more than the players, more than
the fans, more than Canadians and Russians knew.
So began an entirely improbable, near-month-long series of games that
became more and more riveting, until, for the eighth, and final, and
deciding game--on a weekday, during work and school hours all across the
country--the nation stopped. Of Canada's 22 million people, 16 million
watched. Three thousand more were there, in Moscow, behind the Iron
Curtain, singing--Da da, Ka-na-da, nyet, nyet, So-vi-yet!
It is a story long told, often told. But never like this.
Ken Dryden, a goalie in the series, a lifetime observer, later a writer,
tells the story in "you are there" style, as if he is living it for the
first time. As if you, the reader, are too.
The series, as it turned out, is the most important moment in hockey
history, changing the game, on the ice and off, everywhere in the world.
As it turned out, it is one of the most significant events in all of
Canada's history.
Through Ken Dryden's words, we understand why.
