It’s Hall of Fame Selection Time Again!

Hi everyone! It’s that time of year again, folks! Time to vote for the next three inductees to the Seals Hall of Fame.  I’m opening the poll today, so make sure to cast your vote now.  Or should I say “votes”?  That’s right! This year you can vote for up to THREE people you feel should be inducted into the Seals Hall of Fame.  Like last year, however, you can only vote once per device, but since almost everyone and their dog now has an iPhone, iPad, laptop, PC, and 67 other fancy computer doodads, that’s a pretty sweet deal!  The results of the survey will be announced in July 2018, when Golden Seals Hockey celebrates its second anniversary.  You can find the survey on the right side of the webpage, so head on over there right now!

There is also a brand new addition to the Overexposed wing of the Hockey Hall of Shame, a strange card from the 1988-89 AHL Maine Mariners team set.  If you’ve got a thing for dude’s wearing wool sweaters and dreaming of hitting it off with a middle-aged Bob Eubanks, THIS is the card for you!  Enjoy!

Thanks again for all your support and for going out to find my book on the Interweb.  If you happen to like it, or even if you don’t and you just want to make me happy, please go to Amazon, or Library Thing, or Goodreads, or some other book review site, and leave some positive feedback.  Steve wants to buy himself that Porsche someday, so let’s all make that happen, shall we?  Awesome.

Until next time, stay gold!

The Virtual Publicity Tour Continues This Monday!

Hi everyone! Thanks to everyone who has gone out and purchased a copy of my book!  So far, reader reviews have been overwhelmingly positive, so thank you to everyone who has written positive feedback on various websites.  As I continue my (virtual) publicity tour, I’d like to draw your attention to a few things that may be of interest to you. First, is a great piece about me and how I came up with the idea of writing a book about the California Golden Seals from Society for International Hockey Research member and author Greg Oliver (Gratoony the Loony: The Wild, Unpredictable Life of Gilles Gratton, Father Bauer and the Great Experiment: The Genesis of Canadian Olympic Hockey, and Don’t Call Me Goon: Hockey’s Greatest Enforcers, Gunslingers, and Bad Boys). You can read Greg’s story on the SIHR website: http://www.sihrhockey.org/__a/public/column.cfm?cid=4&aid=488.  And while you’re at it, think about signing up to the organization so you can have access to tons of great hockey material, including blog entries, statistics databases, and the SIHR yearly research journal.

I will also be doing a Reddit AMA on Monday, November 20, from 9-10pm EST, if any of you are interested in asking me questions about the Seals, Barons, or my book.

I will also be getting the podcast treatment this Monday morning as well from Tim Hanlon of Good Seats Still Available, so be sure to check it out here.

As for new material on this site, there is a new Overexposed for you, and it features Hall-of-Famer Jean Ratelle in a classic 1978-79 O-Pee-Chee catastrophe. Enjoy!

I’ve also added a new section to the website where I will review review all sorts of hockey books, many of which will have some sort of connection to the Seals.  This week, I review Dennis Maruk: The Unforgettable Story of Hockey’s Forgotten 60-Goal Man.

Until next time, stay gold!

 

And Now the Promotional Tour Begins!

Hi everyone!  As you can read by the title above, it’s now promotion time for my book, The California Golden Seals, so this week’s update will be small, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t cool new things for you to look into.  First, I will be doing a Reddit AMA on Friday, November 10 (that means tomorrow, if you’re reading this Thursday), from 9-10pm, so if you’re interested in participating, make sure you sign up for a Reddit account here.  I will be answering questions involving the Seals, my book, the state of hockey, what toppings I like on my pizza, and why the Alphabet Song and Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star are the EXACT SAME THING…

Ok, I have to digress just a minute here.  My son was watching the Wiggles the other day, and as I’m washing the dishes, I hear the Alphabet Song come on, and I’m thinking, “Holy crap, this is Twinkle, Twinkle!” It just totally blew my mind!  I never noticed that in 38 years; these two songs, which I’ve heard hundreds of times each, are the exact same thing. Seriously, sing the alphabet while replacing the words to Twinkle, Twinkle…

See what I mean? Weird, isn’t it?

Anyway, back to the task at hand… Reddit tomorrow night, 9-10pm.  Come one, come all!  Got that? Ok good.

As you may remember, I was interviewed by Tim Hanlon of Good Seats Still Available last weekend, and he is going to be posting the hour-long (!) interview on his site very soon, likely around November 13, but he will let me know for sure.  In the meantime, check out the other interviews he’s done with other writers promoting some very cool books about very obscure sports teams and personalities.  There is a gold mine of killer stories here, so check out the site here.

I also plan on writing a review of Dennis Maruk and Ken Reid’s new book on the career of the Fu Manchu-wearing 3-M Line star.  I thought I had pre-ordered it in September, but Amazon informed me that that was not the case, so I re-ordered it and just received it yesterday.  From the first twenty pages I read yesterday, it looks like an interesting read.

Finally, a brand new induction to the Overexposed wing of the Hockey Hall of Shame.  This week, we feature one Randy Wood making his second appearance on this site.  Unfortunately, his second appearance isn’t any better than his first.  You can see what I mean right here.

Until next time, stay gold!

Official Book Launch Today!

Hi everyone! HUGE update today, folks!  First of all, my book, The California Golden Seals: a Tale of White Skates, Red Ink, and One of the NHL’s Most Outlandish Teams is now officially available, and if you haven’t already pre-ordered it, you can pick it up from the University of Nebraska Press for $36.95 US… no, wait, we can do better than that.  If you order in the next 30 minutes, you can get the book at a 30% discount!  Come to think of it, I always wondered how that “30-minute” thing made any sense.  Considering these commercials are probably always on somewhere in North America at any time of any given day, couldn’t you just order the product in question at any time and get the special offer.  Is it even possible to buy the product at the regular price?  Suddenly, that special offer just seems like a regular old offer, and that doesn’t seem so special to me. Oh, well… anyway, you can download the order form for my book here and then you just have to follow the instructions to get the book delivered to your home; it’s that simple!  Don’t forget to include the promo code to get the discount.  You can also visit my book detail page at the University of Nebraska website for more information on what’s inside.

Most important, and I can’t stress this enough, if you like the book, please leave some feedback and a rating on Amazon.ca or Amazon.com, depending on the country where you live.  Other good places to leave comments are Goodreads and Library Thing.  You can create an account and rate all of your favourite books and join groups of readers with similar interests to share insight on what books you should read next.

And if that isn’t enough good news, there is a brand new interview featuring yours truly now available in the video and audio section!  It’s only 12 minutes long, so it’s not very time-consuming, so give it a listen.  There will be other interviews in the coming weeks as well, so come back to the site for more updates on when those will start appearing online.  This Saturday, I will be taping an hour-long interview with Tim Hanlon of Good Seats Still Available.  You’ve probably already heard his two interviews with Mark Greczmiel and Krazy George Henderson, but if you haven’t, check those out as well in the video and audio section.

I will also be doing a Reddit AMA on Friday, November 10, from 9-10pm after my son goes down for the night.  Hopefully, he won’t be climbing out of his crib and forcing me to put him back in while holding my laptop and typing all at the same time.  It might make for an interesting experience, so check it out.

Oh, and there is so much more this week!  There is a Len Haley expo in the photo section, thanks to subscriber Dave Martell.  He sent along some great rare photos you will want to check out.

Wow, that’s a lot of new stuff.  That should keep you guys busy for a little while.  Until next time, stay gold!