Bootsie's No. 8

Sometimes, a true fan's burden and blessing is to root for the team or player who is never going to win. There's a connection, a sympathy, to the object of affection and rationality doesn't have anything to do with it.

So it is that WD finds itself rooting for the Bootsies. The projected 8-volume series about a kid and rugby is not the project of  The Mike James (i.e., not Canada's premier Rugby Unionist). It is instead, the idea that came to Wanneroo, Western Australia, father Mike James. Sitting up hospital nights while his eight-year-old son fought brain cancer was the catalyst for the police officer to turn author. As he writes at The Bootsie Books website:

As I sat next to [Connor's] bed and while we looked after him at home the ideas and books themselves flowed out of me and onto paper. ... The bravery Connor showed is the inspiration for the character. As you read along with the series ‘Bootsie’ is faced with many challenges as most young boys are. Connor just faced a much bigger challenge and he dealt with it like a warrior. Bootsie doesn’t face challenges like his but in his world and at the time of his life they are big enough for him. He too braves his life challenges like a warrior.

The books are self-published and the author hadn't written much since his school days. Neither offers much hope for a series of literary masterpieces taking a young man through his school days. Still, with Bootsie Your 8 now available, our fan finger that "Bootsie is Number 1" is in the air, our vuvuzela is wailing in support and we're hard at work composing the footy club song.