The Awesome Game

In his latest opus, Dave--who's from Cleveland, which hasn't had an NHL team since 1978--tackles this hockey conundrum with full force, drilling down into what makes hockey so damn important in so many parts of the world, despite the average American not recognizing the sport's preeminent greatness. His search for the very soul of hockey has taken him across the globe, from Poland to LA to Kenya, and brought him into contact with many of the sport's great and good. Humorous but heartfelt, Bill Bryson-like but hipper, this is arguably the greatest book ever written about hockey and definitely the one to be asking for at Christmas.