Tanya Bossy wanted to write a book on the life of Mike, her famous father, and Mikaël Lalancette also wanted to write a book on this famous father. A few coffees later, the project became a reality.
The project is the book 50 days in the life of Mike Bossy, the launch of which took place Monday evening, within the walls of the Société Saint-Jean-Baptiste de Montréal, rue Sherbrooke Ouest.
The place was not chosen at random.
“It’s a story that dates back to 1982,” confided Mikaël Lalancette, journalist and writer by trade. The year 1982 was one of the best for Mike, and at the end of the year, the selection committee for the Maurice-Richard prize [given annually to the Quebec athlete who has distinguished himself the most on the international scene] hesitated between him and Pierre Harvey. But it was very divided, because Bossy is of English-speaking origin, and in January 1983 the committee announced that there would be no awards ceremony that year. Maurice Richard was not happy… Mike was not happy either, who was deeply hurt by it, according to what those around him told me. »
But it is never too late to do well, and on this Monday evening of launch, the Société Saint-Jean-Baptiste presented this prize to the Bossy family, posthumously. “There were discussions that started to this effect in 2021, but unfortunately, Mike never found out,” added Mikaël Lalancette.
This little part of life as well as several others are recounted with enthusiasm in 50 Days in the Life of Mike Bossy, which reveals parts of a story that we perhaps did not know in full. Among other things, Bossy’s family past is discussed, with details that are often unknown.
“Mike was born in Montreal to an English-speaking family, a Ukrainian father and a British mother,” explains Mikaël Lalancette. At home, everything was in English, and he went to English school. »
Tanya Bossy remembers a little of this distant past.
“He only spoke English until he was 14 before he met my mother,” she explains. We moved to New York and when we came back here, I was 6 years old and my father put us in French school, and from that point on I never spoke to my father again in English. »
Mike Bossy, who died of lung cancer in 2022, was not keen on the idea of launching a biography himself. A bio was first released in English in the United States in 1988, when he was at the end of his career with the New York Islanders, but there was never anything like it here.
Over time, Tanya Bossy often challenged her father on this subject. “I bothered him all the time with that… When he became ill, there were people who approached him, and I had the chance to talk to him about it again, and then he said yes, it’s is correct… “
It was while reading a text by Lalancette about her father that Tanya Bossy had the idea of contacting the journalist about a possible collaboration. The latter was not hard to convince. “We met for coffee and five minutes later I knew we would do a book together,” he admits.
Monday night’s launch also reminded us that Mike Bossy was more than hockey; there was the player, of course, but also the humor, radio and advertising guy.
“That’s why 50 chapters weren’t too many,” concludes Mikaël Lalancette. After hockey, he did TV, radio, he was an advertising representative, he dabbled in real estate. He did a lot of business, and we also wanted to keep a place for that in the book. »
