Thriller writer Amy Stuart on teaming up with hockey legend Matt Sundin to bring his memoir to life
Amy Stuart is a thriller writer, a hockey mom and a hockey coach. Her latest book is not a thriller, however. She's a lifelong Toronto Maple Leaf fan and she's collaborated with Mats Sundin on his memoir, Home and Away. Sundin is the former captain of the Toronto Maple Leafs and also a Hall of Fame hockey player.
Home and Away tracks a path that began with his parents and two brothers outside Stockholm and eventually led to the Hockey Hall of Fame.
He dives into the pressures and anxieties of being the first European selected No. 1 overall at the NHL draft, getting traded by the Quebec Nordiques to Toronto for franchise icon Wendel Clark, and the turbulent end to his time with the Leafs.
Amy Stuart is a bestselling novelist and short story writer and the author of the thrillers Still Here, Still Mine, Still Water and A Death at the Party.
Amy Stuart spoke to The Next Chapter's Antonio Michael Downing about teaming up with a hockey legend to tell his life story. She also shared a few similar reading recommendations.
Before we get to Mats Sundin, let's check your hockey bona fides. What's your relationship with the game?
I was the middle of three girls. My dad was a huge hockey player. He played in university on Prince Edward Island, grew up playing, and then he had three daughters. So in the seventies and eighties, girls hockey wasn't much of a thing. And he signed me up for figure skating. And on the drive home I said, 'No, I want to play hockey.'
In the seventies and eighties, girls hockey wasn't much of a thing. And he signed me up for figure skating. And on the drive home I said, 'No, I want to play hockey.'- Amy Stuart
So he signed me up at Leaside in Toronto, where I played for all my young life. And then I kept playing into adulthood. And around the same time I started playing, I became a huge fan of the Toronto Maple Leafs. So I was a big fan all through my childhood, and then Sundin would have arrived. I was a teenager when he was traded so I lived a rich life watching him play for years and years and years long before any of this.
The last time you were on The Next Chapter you were talking about your book A Death at the Party. This is a very different book. So how did it come about that you co-wrote Home and Away?
A Death at the Party came out in March 2023, I had a celebratory dinner with some of Simon and Schuster's higher ups and my agent and they were talking about projects in the works and somebody said, "We're really trying to get Mats Sundin to write a memoir. But he has said that he wants to take a different approach. He doesn't want to work with sort of a sports reporter or a journalist. And so it's really hard to find that person."
And I'm a hockey coach, I coach my son in the GTHL. Until recently, I played and I'm still a fan. So I sort of said, 'I could do it.' And they everybody laughed.
I've written, at this point, four books and a book is a book. I know that nonfiction and fiction are not the same, but in memoir and thrillers you still have to tell your story. And my hockey pedigree is very rich. I certainly have no doubts that I can engage with that content. And so everybody sort of laughed, but then frowned thoughtfully. And then we all left the dinner. And two weeks later, I got a call.
How much did you know about his life prior to that when you started the project?
Very little. So Mats, I think any Toronto fan would of that era would tell you that Mats was pretty notorious for being a private person. He had a very clear media persona, which was pretty reserved, always very respectful, willing to talk to the media, open about hockey, about the game, but his personal life and any sense of who he was, I think, was left off the table.
So what surprised you the most about his life as this collaboration unfolded?
I think that what was most fascinating to me was the the mid-eighties, sort of 1985. He would have been 14, too, when he was drafted first overall in 1989. That was such a remarkable time, not just in his life and in hockey, but in the world, too. And that time in his life really coincided with the USSR breaking down.
Even though you wouldn't travel to the USSR behind the Iron Curtain for tourism back then, you could travel there for hockey. And he went to Moscow and to Czechoslovakia at the time on a bus trip through East Germany. And he tells all these stories in the book.
All these changes that were happening in the world, were weirdly reflected in hockey players coming to Canada and the U.S. at the time.- Amy Stuart
And I think that for me, it was that piece of his insight into what was happening in the world through the lens of hockey and then also the experience of European players coming to Canada sort of reflected this wider global political system. All these changes that were happening in the world, were weirdly reflected in hockey players coming to Canada and the U.S. at the time.
He's also really funny and really a wonderful storyteller. His parents, his brothers, even his kids. They're all sort of this funny, energetic group. And I think just being able to be part of that and absorbed into that, it was such an honour. And I was really happy to see how much joy and good humour is in his life.
You brought a couple hockey books. What's the first one?
Beartown by Frederick Backman
This book was made into a TV series. It's about eight years old. One thing that Beartown taught me as a novel — I read it years and years ago — was that you could take something relatively niche like hockey and use it as the backbone for a thriller.
The book is actually it is very literary. It takes place in a in a fictional northern town in Sweden. Frederick Backman is a Swedish writer, and one of the reasons I picked him is because he is a huge Sundin fan. I was surprised and it's sort of this funny connection.
It's one of those books where you really don't have to care at all about hockey to get absorbed into the story. And I think that with with Home and Away, that was something we were going for.
How can you bring in the reader who doesn't care about hockey? You have to focus on the other the life aspects. And, and he even though Bear Town is a novel, he really did that. He's such a beautiful writer.
How can you bring in the reader who doesn't care about hockey?- Amy Stuart
So what's your next book?
Dreamer by Nazem Kadri
Another hockey book, a memoir that actually just came out around the same time as Home and Away. It's called Dreamer by Nazem Kadri.
Nazem Kadri is an NHL player. He played in Toronto for many years and then traded from Toronto to Colorado, where he won the Stanley Cup. And he was the first Muslim player to hoist the Stanley Cup. I was really happy that he took the time to tell his story because as a Muslim Canadian — he grew up in London, Ontario — I'm sure it was a complicated journey for him.
He does a really good job and Dan Robson was his co-writer. Dan Robson is just really like actually the guy in terms of co-writing hockey books. Just like we have the cultural conversations that come up in Beartown — the idea of race in hockey is such — it's complicated and there's a lot of work to do.
We all know that hockey is a predominantly white male sport, and for Kadri, he would have been coming up playing in the early 2000s like that would have been a difficult time.
And to think that it took, given the Canadian landscape until 2022, for a Muslim player to hoist the cup like I'm so glad that it happened. But it's pretty amazing — 100 plus years into the sport that it took that long. People need to be able to see themselves on the ice.
I think that there's there's an understanding now that the longevity of the sport is tied to its ability to change and adapt.- Amy Stuart
I will say I coach in the GTHL, which is the largest youth hockey league in the world. And I do see a desire to change, which is, I don't want to say new because I think it's always been there, but it's catching on like it's spreading because I think that there's there's an understanding now that the longevity of the sport is tied to its ability to change and adapt.
Amy Stuart's comments have been edited for length and clarity.
