A local author is helping raise funds for Literacy Nipissing once again.

Last year, a fundraiser was held with Dennis Chippa‘s book “Santa Lost His Suit”, based on a poem he’s been reading at Haleyfest.

Now he’s written “Back to Work for Santa’s Elves” which he calls a bit of a travel log of North Bay in the summer.

“The premise is, in order to go back to work early, the elves convince Santa that they love North Bay during in the winter when they come here Christmas Eve, they prefer to see what North Bay is like in the summer time,” Chippa said.

He points out students at Widdifield Secondary School once again did the art work for the book.

“The students did such a fantastic job, the only difference this year is the students are that much more comfortable and confident in what they’re doing. It was just an amazing thing to watch the real hard work that the students and the teachers at Widdifield did,” he said.

Last year 2,000 copies of the book were either sold or donated to the Santa Fund, Big Brothers Big Sisters and others.

$15,000 was raised, including through an auction of the artwork done by the Widdifield students.

The books are available at Literacy Nipissing on Sherbrooke Street, Gulliver’s Quality Books and Toys on Main West and The Co-operators on Airport Road.