Curtis Joseph’s autobiography/memoir is an overly long, yet interesting read for a hockey fan. Joseph’s story is one of community, resilience, and love. It is heartbreaking to read at times and hard to understand how so many adults could see all that was lacking in his life and not step up in a more meaningful way.
The book starts with Joseph explaining his childhood and his odd upbringing. Joseph was adopted when he was a baby, but not for a long time because his birth mother was not certain she could actually give him up. However, Joseph always knew he was not living with his birth mother all the same.
The first third of the book is the most interesting part with Joseph detailing his childhood, his time at Athol Murray College of Notre Dame in Saskatchewan, choosing an American university to attend, and picking a NHL team with his agent. Once his professional career got started, he spent more time talking about game to game details and less time exploring the personal side of his decisions like leaving Edmonton for Toronto. It would have been nice to spend more time with Curtis Joseph the person instead of Curtis Joseph the player after we spent so much time with him in the first bit of the book.
Curtis Joseph’s book is a good read, but at its current format, much too long with very short chapters and not enough time spent with the adult Joseph after getting to know the young Joseph so well. It is available from the library and while there might be a waitlist for it right now, it should not be that long as the book has been out for a while already.
