I’m thrilled to finally release the details of my new, upcoming book The Lonely End of the Rink: Confessions of a Reluctant Goalie.

I was once again close to writing a book about music, but just as was the case with the first book, Adventures in Solitude, I got distracted with another topic that I am very passionate (and conflicted) about: HOCKEY.

I’ve been writing this book for about three years, with a large majority of it written in France in 2011. I will happily be signing pre-orders through this site, probably starting in early September. I’ll let the press peeps take over from here for the full details of the book… please let me know what you think of the title, the cover (designed by Naomi MacDougall), and the subject, by leaving a comment. Thanks!

From the press peeps:

CBC’S GRANT LAWRENCE ANNOUNCES NEW BOOK “THE LONELY END OF THE RINK”

Grant Lawrence, the CBC Radio broadcaster, musician, and award-winning author, has announced the title, cover, and release date of his hotly anticipated new memoir.

“The Lonely End of the Rink: Confessions of a Reluctant Goalie” chronicles Grant Lawrence’s turbulent and often darkly hilarious relationship with the game of hockey.

Lawrence was an undersized child who wore thick glasses and knee-braces, and he understood, first-hand, what it was like to be in the attack zone of the hockey-obsessed jocks at school. For Grant, bullying and the violent game of hockey seemed to go hand-in-hand. Yet he was enamoured with the sport and its characters, especially the solitary goalies down at the ‘lonely end of the rink’.

Eventually, Lawrence discovered that playing goalie on a hockey team isn’t all that different from playing in a rock ‘n’ roll band. And that artistically-minded wimps can find just as much joy in the game as their meathead counterparts.

In this deeply revealing, incredibly witty memoir, the fast-paced narrative of “The Lonely End of the Rink” passes back and forth between tales of Grant’s turbulent and often violent ordeals with hockey jocks, and the three failed attempts at the Stanley Cup by his beloved hometown Vancouver Canucks.

“Despite all the bullying I was subjected to, I absolutely adored the Vancouver Canucks, especially those Cup-Run goalies of Richard Brodeur, Kirk McLean and Roberto Luongo. I have always had a fascination with that unique position and the ‘lonely end of the rink’, so it wasn’t much of a surprise that I became a goalie myself”.

“The Lonely End of the Rink” takes its name from a song by The Tragically Hip. Lead singer Gord Downie is an ex-goalie himself, and personally gave his blessing to Lawrence for the use of the title.

“The Lonely End of the Rink: Confessions of a Reluctant Goalie” will be published by Douglas and McIntyre in October 2013.

Follow Grant Lawrence on Twitter.

Follow Grant Lawrence on Instagram.

Getting chased by dinosaurs in Drumheller, Alberta.

Hey yo from the Trans Canada Highway! I’ve been receiving a few emails, tweets, and Facebook messages asking me what the heck this CBC Beetle Roadtrip is all about, so I thought I would answer a few of those questions here…

Maybe you’ve seen the ads on CBC television, maybe you’ve seen a tweet or a Facebook photo, or seen one of the videos on CBC Music.ca.

Here’s the scoop: I’m in the middle of an epic Vancouver to Toronto roadtrip in a brand new Volkswagen Beetle Fender Edition. It’s like driving a rolling amplifier. The Beetle is shiny black and has attracted a lot of attention every where we’ve travelled so far.

The whole point of the trip is to hook up with great bands across the country, filming exclusive performances in their own habitat and unique locations in and around their hometown. Those sessions are being posted on CBCMusic.ca and being show on George Stroumboulopoulos Tonight on CBC TV.

We’re a week and a half in and already we’ve had plenty of wild and wooly adventures:

– I’ve had a live goat shoved into the CBC Beetle.

– I’ve been shoved off a raft into the swift current of a glacier river.

– I’ve plunged naked into Lake Louise.

– I’ve been (almost) mauled by dinosaurs and communed with prairie dogs.

Still to come, adventures from across the Canadian shield, and stops in Ottawa, Montreal, Kingston and more, including a finale party on Friday June 14 at CBC Toronto with The Darcys. Leave a comment if you’ll be in Toronto and you’d like to attend.

You can also follow the trip on my Instagram account and check out all the photos so far.

I jumped into Lake Louise! It was cold!

An orca whale 'spy hopping' in Desolation Sound, April 1, 2013. Photo by Jill Barber.

2013 is the thirtieth anniversary of our family cabin in Desolation Sound, BC. It was in 1983 that the cabin finally came to completion after many snags, and it was that spring that we first starting going up regularly. Before that, we camped.

To celebrate the thirtieth anniversary of our little place in the wilderness, my wife Jill and I just spent one of the most spectacular holiday weekends we’ve ever had at the cabin. Each morning we woke up to a thick, pea soup fog that mystically burned off at 10am every day.

Big Buck$ sits waiting for the fog to lift for another gorgeous day. Photo by JB.

The lifting fog revealed glorious, blazing sunshine without a cloud in the sky, summer temperatures, and glassy calm blue seas. And it wouldn’t have been a trip to Desolation Sound without my lanky pal Rory and his wife Julie and their kids coming by in his boat the Salubrious Chief to take us out for a day of exploring and adventure.

A perfect mirrored reflection on the canals of Prideaux Haven. This is very close to the shot that is on the back cover of 'Adventures in Solitude'. Photo by JB.

After a stop at the Curme Islands, then a picnic in beautiful Prideaux Haven, we roared across the expanse of the Sound to Squirrel Cove, on Cortes Island, the only open general store north of Lund at this time of year. On the way we spotted a pod of porpoises, their stunted black dorsal fins just clearing the surface of the ocean.

In Squirrel Cove, after a booze / ice cream / gas up, Rory’s boat conked out, meaning we had to hitchhike home. Some new pals from Refuge Cove and a giant black dog named Henry gave us a ride on an open oyster skiff  as the sun set over Desolation Sound.

Jill bundling up riding home on the open bow of an oyster skiff.

The next day, we fired up my boat, the mighty Big Buck$, Terror of the Inlet, for the recovery mission, slowly towing the Salubrious Chief back to the Okeover dock, where we said goodbye to Rory and his family as they headed back to the city.

Jill and I had one more day in paradise. An Easter weekend in Desolation Sound wouldn’t be complete without an Easter feast at our neighbours Anita and Darrell’s, at the house that hangs off the cliff like a diver ready to jump.

The next morning, after the fog lifted, we packed up Big Buck$ and headed home. As we passed by our neighbour’s cabins, Anita waved us down and told us there was a pod of orcas half way down the inlet towards the dock. I freaked out.

Thar she blows! Mamma orca with two little ones nearby in Desolation Sound BC.

Could it be? In the thirty years of our family’s cabin being in Desolation Sound, I have never, ever seen orcas in our inlets. I’ve seen dolphins, porpoises, sea lions, seals, otters, eagles, oyster catchers, mergansers, and marbled murreletes, but never a killer whale. It’s the one animal I have always dreamt of seeing in the Sound for thirty long years.

And sure enough, there they were… a family of four. A big bull male, a large female with a very distinct, curled dorsal fin like a shepherd’s staff, and two very young, rambunctious small calves, the smallest one tailing the mother constantly. We watched them chase fish for as long as we could, taking as many photos as we could, until we knew we were getting close to missing the ferry home.

Seeing those orcas on that beautiful Easter Monday morning was a spectacular, fitting, and moving way to end a perfect weekend and celebrate thirty years amazing years of travelling two and from our cabin in the BC coastal wilderness.

Related:

Dolphins of Desolation Sound (video)

Upcoming events in Powell River / Desolation Sound area