Tales from the Boston Bruins Locker Room: A Collection of the Greatest Bruins Stories Ever Told

by Kerry Keene

In this fascinating collection of Bruins tales, Kerry Keene brings readers behind the scenes and captures the stories that have defined the franchise throughout its storied history. From the team’s inception in 1924 up through their 2011 championship run, Tales from the Boston Bruins Locker Room has it all. This treasure trove of Bruins lore brings Boston’s best hockey players to life with stories about Bobby Orr, Ray Bourque, Phil Esposito, Zdeno Chara, Tim Thomas, and other Bruins legends.

Learn what Bruins jersey number was retired twice, who started the tradition of painting stitches on hockey masks, how the 1977 Bruins team inspired author George Plimpton to write the book Open Net, and relive the greatest moments of the 2011 Stanley Cup Finals.

Genres: Nonfiction, Sports

192 pages, Hardcover

First published June 1, 2011

Reviews

[Mike · Rating 4 out of 5]

I decided to give this 4-stars in the end, though may only deserve 3 - I can understand some of the complaints about this book. For starters, it goes alphabetically as opposed to chronologically, which gets a bit confusing to follow. - Most of the players have only a few short paragraphs, which can be good or bad depending on the player. Some of them don't need more than a paragraph, but others certainly could've used a bit more detail. For instance, Joe Thorton had a whopping four sentences total, and one of them was about how he wore Scooby Doo underwear. - Many of the mentions were players who played one game, or a fraction of a game, while interesting to some degree, not always necessary to mention. There were also many mentionable names left out (Don Sweeney, among others).

All that said - I did enjoy the book as a quick fun read. It's more of a fun-fact / brush up on your trivia type of book. Entertaining enough to read from start to finish.

[Kristin · Rating 2 out of 5]

For a book that's supposed to be about "stories", it's really more a collection of random factoids, though some of the information is interesting. And the few times a story is mentioned, it seems to be more of a short recap of a story than the actual story.

[Michele · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great summary of some of the best, and worst, to don the black and gold.

[Eric Onkenhout · Rating 2 out of 5]

Some interesting tidbits. A lot of real obvious players left out. Poorly written. Poor editing.

[Matt Kratz · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good book about the history of the Bruins. I enjoyed reading.

[Joseph · Rating 2 out of 5]

It is was it is, I suppose, although I'm perplexed both by its alphabetical organization and the selection of players to be included. The obvious ones are there, of course, but it's strange that the book completely ignores the current team, while some of the inclusions are just bizarre. I have fond memories of Hal Gill, for instance, but when his blurb boils down to the fact that he was a fan of Ray Bourque, I have to wonder if there wasn't something else that could have taken up that space.

There's little here more detailed than a poorly researched wikipedia article, and by organizing it alphabetically, rather than chronologically, there's nothing in the way of narrative to keep things interested. In no way does it live up to its subtitle.

[TJ · Rating 2 out of 5]

Overall a mildly interesting book. However it is not the book the cover describes. The title is tales from the Boston Bruins Locker Room, however most of the stories are not from the locker room, they are stories about old players. Some stories were interesting, but many were not. Also the cover features the 2011 Stanley cup winning team, yet none of those players are even mentioned in the book. I was annoyed that the publisher would allow such a deceptive cover to be used. I liked the book but I am rating it, I didn't like as it wasn't as the cover advertised.