The very prolific Simon Boulerice has imagined here a sympathetic tale with nostalgic contours of an era he could not know, the one just before the Olympic Games in Montreal, in 1976. He tells how Patrice, who s’ going “on his tenth birthday in July”, gives himself the mission of consoling a not so vile thief, who tried to rob his house by disguising himself as Santa Claus and going through the chimney, where he got stuck. The young lover of “scale models”, who has carefully reproduced the majestic stadium, not quite finished, and other wonders of Expo 67, will talk with frankness and compassion with this strange thief, incidentally thrower of javelins who was to represent Canada at the Olympics the following summer. This wacky and moving story, set with surprising cultural references and often very comical dialogues, is elegantly served by LaCharbonne’s illustrations, straight out of an increasingly distant era.
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