Read a few books recently:
The Hot Line: How the Legendary Trio of Hull, Hedberg and Nilsson Transformed Hockey and Led the Winnipeg Jets to Greatness by Jeff Kirbyson. This wasn't too bad, but it really felt kind of empty. It's mostly a collection of reminiscences from contemporaries, who all universally praise the skill of all three, though this only goes for about the first half of the book. The second half looks at the WHA in a larger part, and then discusses the legacy of the line, ending with an appeal to have Hedberg and Nilsson inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame (Hull already is). While a good read, it would have been better to have some more analysis and background on the players and team, instead of constantly quoting other people.
Fabric of the Game: The Stories Behind the NHL's Names, Logos, and Uniforms by Chris Creamer, Todd Radom. The book is an in-depth look at every team in NHL history and their uniform styles. A quick summary of the team's history is followed by the origin of the name and then the design choices behind the logo and jerseys. They do a great job of covering the specifics (noting the designers when possible), and give good coverage to the older defunct teams as well. It is heavy on text though, and while there are plenty of images to demonstrate things, more would certainly have been welcome.
World of Hockey: Celebrating a Century of the IIHF edited by Szymon Szemberg and Andrew Podnieks. It was released ahead of the 2008 World Championships to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the IIHF. It's an oversized, coffee-table style book, with a lot of photos, but still quite a bit of text. It does a nice job at looking at the history of international hockey, albeit brief (considering the style of book), and also has a section about the history of all IIHF member countries at the end, which was really neat.
Dream Job: My Wild Ride on the Corporate Side with the Leafs, the Raptors and TFC by Richard Peddie. This is the (ghostwritten) autobiography of the former president of MLSE. Unfortunately it doesn't get too much into that work, and he spends quite a bit of time talking about his earlier career (with Hostess, Pilsbury, and so on), and then spends a good part of the book on his business philosophy (including way too much time on company vision statements). I read it hoping to see more insight about the business side of MLSE, but this really didn't do it, and it wasn't worth the time reading. I also found it odd how he kept making a few shots at unions throughout the book, which was totally unnecessary to the overall structure (as a business executive it's clear he would not favour unions, so it just came off as odd).
