[6] At the age of 16 he delivered his first humanitarian aid convoy to a refugee camp near Mostar in Bosnia with a church group, encountering mass graves and bombed out villages.
[12] During their time in Jersey, Boas and his wife volunteered for the Honorary Police in their home parish of Trinity, which entailed being called out to deal with incidents like dangerous overhanging branches and loose horses, but he never made any arrests.
[15] In September 2023, when he was age 46, Boas wrote an article in the Jersey Evening Post where he announced that lumps in his neck and difficulty swallowing had been diagnosed as terminal throat cancer.
Despite chemotherapy and radiotherapy at Southampton General Hospital,[16] the squamous-cell carcinoma[15] spread to his lungs, liver, spine, pelvis, sternum and soft tissues.
[16] People from all over the world contacted him, including celebrants and priests who wanted permission to read parts of the letters at weddings or in sermons.
[13] During his last days, he was due to meet Charles III and Queen Camilla at a tea party during their visit to the island,[20] but as his condition had worsened, instead the Lieutenant Governor of Jersey delivered a hand-written[10] letter from them which said how moved they had been by his charitable work and courage.
His book, A Beginner's Guide to Dying (ISBN 9781800755031), became the second-best seller on Amazon.co.uk through pre-orders[13] before being published posthumously in hardback by Swift Press on 12 September 2024.
A section entitled 'Death and Equanimity' includes his thoughts on meditation, gratitude, God and religion, counselling, others' grief, psychedelics – in which he advocates use of psilocybin, miracle cures, hope and acceptance, thinking about death, optimism, regrets and bucket lists.
[25] Reviewing the book for The Guardian, Alex Preston wrote that "you're struck repeatedly by the terrible juxtaposition of the rush of erudition from this fantastically bright mind still thrumming with life and wit, and the silence of the end, which is so near."