The Good Body — Bill Gaston

The Good Body is a triumphant blend of mordant humour and heartbreak. It tells the comic and poignant story of a retired pro-hockey ruffian named Bobby Bonaduce who is stubbornly ignoring a disease - multiple sclerosis - that may be killing him. Bobby returns to his hometown and scams his way into university in a misguided attempt to redeem his messy past and lay emotional claim to a son he abandoned twenty years earlier.

With this terrific novel, Bill Gaston demonstrates yet again that he is "a writer of great empathy, capable it seems of getting beneath the skin of anybody." (2002 Giller Prize jury)