Logan In Overtime

by Paul Quarrington

Logan’s professional hockey career didn’t exactly go the way he’d hoped. He was never a household name… even in his own household. This time even his goalie pads couldn’t protect him when he hit rock bottom — as goaltender for the hapless Falconbridge Falcons. How much lower can you go than the cellar of a Northern Ontario industrial hockey league? But things begin to change when a game against the Hope Blazers goes into overtime — and stays there. Soon everyone is interested, including Hockey Night in Canada, who fly in to check out the game.

Genres: Sports

224 pages, Paperback

First published February 1, 1990

About the author

Paul Quarrington was a novelist and musician, an award-winning screenwriter, filmmaker, and an acclaimed non-fiction writer. His last novel The Ravine was published in March 2008. His previous novel Galveston was nominated for the Giller; Whale Music won the Governor General’s Award for Fiction. Quarrington won the Stephen Leacock Medal for King Leary, a title that also won the 2008 Canada Reads competition. As a musician, he played in the band PorkBelly Futures; their self-titled second CD was released in April 2008; the first CD Way Past Midnight was extremely well received. His screenplays and story editing have won many awards, most recently the CFPTA Indie Award for Comedy for the series Moose TV, and he was in high demand as a story editor for feature films and television. Paul ’s filmmaking talents as writer / director were evident in his BookShorts short film, Pavane, which he adapted from The Ravine and was featured in the Moving Stories Film Festival September - November 2008. His non-fiction writing included books on some of his favourite pastimes such as fishing, hockey and music. He regularly contributed book reviews, travel columns and journalism to Canada’s national newspapers and magazines. Paul lived and worked in Toronto, where he taught writing at Humber College and University of Toronto, and sat on the Board of Directors for the Fringe Theatre Festival. Quarrington was also an (extremely) amateur magician and a would-be mariner.

Paul was diagnosed with Stage 4 lung cancer in May of 2009. He died at home, with his family.

Reviews

[Colin Bruce Anthes · Rating 4 out of 5]

There is a review by the Toronto Sun of Paul Quarrington's work that calls it "Canadian humour, 1980's style, at its best". This wasn't in reference to Logan in Overtime, but it might as well have been. Taking place in a small Canadian middle-of-nowhere where everyone's a little kooky, a third of the action takes place in a quirky bar, and the subject is a hockey squad only the locals could get, this is as Canadian as it comes. If it's possible for a book to be low budget, this one is. These are traits that often make the comedies (and rather desperate dramas) of my native land insufferable, but once in a blue moon make for a gem. Logan in Overtime is a gem. Authentic, funny, and compulsively readable from the first to the last page, Mr. Quarrington penned a winner here. For those who like Canadian comedy when it works, read this.

[Kelly Dvorak · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is by far the funniest of Paul's hockey books. Aliens and a rec hockey game that takes on epic meaning with each over time period. Plus if you love goalies like I do...