Customer Reviews

They Don't Play Hockey in Heaven: A Dream, A Team, and My Comeback Season

5 star:		(17)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This book about life in minor league hockey is a really wonderful read. It's a fascinating combination of sports story and inner journey, told with just the right balance between excitement and introspection. There are lots of entertaining action moments in this book, but it also has its share of spiritual insights, although the author is not heavy-handed about them. I literally couldn't put this book down and ended up reading it cover-to-cover in one sitting. I heartily recommend it.

I could not put this book down. His determination to live his dream is a true inspiration. It tells us the ups and downs, the sacrifices he had to make to live that dream. As a goalie myself, I have to admit we are strange. Who else in their right mind would face men with razors on their feet, ready to to fire a vulcanized hockey puck at you as hard as they can.

I have dreams as well, and started playing goalie at the age of 45. After reading this book, in one sitting, I went out tonight and played the best game of my short career. It was my dream, but it pales in comparison to Ken's dream

The book also gives us an interesting "behind the locker room door" look at minor league hockey. But this is not a book just for hockey fans

Ken Baker did a great job of captivating the reader's attention and holding it throughout. A great expose on minor league hockey and life in general. A motivating, moving and sincere story that will make you think, tear-up and follow your dreams.

If you like hockey or even if you don't you won't be able to put this book down. It's moving to the point of being captivating. In telling his comeback story Ken Baker reveals much about the inside workings of minor league pro hockey. He is transparent about his own life as well as presenting an expose on pro hockey. It's easy reading but also inspiring. This is one you'll want to read and pass on to your friends.

Was this the best book ever written on hockey? Of course not but it is a very entertaining read.Now the reviewer from buffalo seems like he has an axe to grind.Yes this may have been low minor league hockey but who of us woundnt persue the same dream if we had the choice.Having worked in minor league hockey I found alot of his stories to ring true and being a former goalie who never got to pursue his dream its nice to sort of live it through someone else.I applaud Mr Baker for his book and for his having the ability to follow his dream.I hope he has continued sucess in what ever he moves on to.Im happy to have read his book and recommend it to any true hockey fan.

This is a fantastic book that puts you right on the buses, benches, and bars with the lowest of the low minor pro hockey leagues. Ken Baker does an excellent job inviting the reader into his quest for The Dream...to play pro hockey. I found myself with tears in my eyes at times reading this book, and other times I was laughing out loud. You don't even have to like hockey or sports to love this book...you just have to have a dream, and the desire to follow it.

Ken Baker has lived through the worst life could throw at him and come out on top. I not only have actually read his book, I also work with the team he wrote about and I am able to say that this book is as open and honest as a writer can get. Ken lets his reader see the desire he had to find out what he could accomplish once his illness was in remission and being controlled by medication. He allows you to live with him through his daily battle between depression that he might not get to play and excitement that he might. Ken will draw you in and keep you enthralled to the last page. Well written and deserving of every positive review he has received.

Someone had given my husband a copy of this book to read and I picked it up one day because I am a big-time hockey fan. I read it cover to cover in all of about five hours. I was completely absorbed by Ken Baker's story, I think much more so because I know a lot of the players he talked about. Jason Firth, John Vary, Willett, Hayzie and my favorite, Beau-beau(David-Alexander Beauregard), I smiled each time I read their names, thinking of the times they spent in Port Huron over the years. Minor league hockey is not glamorous (try being married to a broadcaster), but Baker's dream moved me. So many people in his position would have just given up and he kept digging deeper, he knew he could do it if given the chance. I wish I could be that brave.

I couldn't put it down. A GREAT book!. I read it over and over again. It's very inspiring. Helped to recongized the importance of fulfilling a dream. It's way more than a hockey book it teaches life gulidlines.

You don't have to have read Ken's first book "Man Made" to feel the gut wrenching decisions and sacrafices that Ken made when he decided to put the rest of his life on hold so that he could go for his dream. I was lucky enough to see Ken go through some of the paces that his decision led him through. His patience had to equal his desire to go for his dream. As Ken waited for his chance to play he found a niche in the hearts of the Bakersfield fans who in part lived his dream with him. If Ken makes it sound like it is his last big game in the NHL, it is! Because to him, his wife and to all the Bakersfield Condor's fans-it was that big. The excitement in that final game was tremendous. I feel like I was part of something really special. Ken is witty and wise and shares with the reader behind the scene happenings with the goons, the goofs and also the sadness that comes with injury, age and distance from family and home. I feel like I had a front row seat for the making of this book. I am lucky. Read Ken's book, it will challenge your desire to go for that proverbial dream.