What if Santa got stranded in Maine on Christmas Eve, unable to finish his route?
That’s the question answered in a new children’s book by a Maine author, illustrator, cartoonist and letter cutter. “One Maine Christmas Eve,” by debut author Douglas Coffin, was released by Tilbury House Publishers last month.
The new book was both written and illustrated by Coffin, who drew the nationally syndicated cartoon strip “Fletcher’s Landing” in the early 1980s and created editorial cartoons for a weekly paper for 20 years.
But while the book is newly released, this story might be familiar to some Mainers. It’s a slightly updated version of something he created more than 30 years ago for a Maine weekly.
“I wrote it in 1978 when I was the cartoonist for Maine Times, which was a weekly newspaper [for] the state,” Coffin said. “I had a cartoon strip every week and for Christmas I asked the editor if we could do more than just a strip.”
The editor agreed, and Coffin created the first version of “One Maine Christmas Eve.”
“It’s very much a nod to Clement Moore’s piece,” Coffin said.
In Coffin’s version, though, the story looks at how Mainers would handle a Christmas crisis like Santa’s reindeer falling ill mid-flight.
“The original intent, and it still holds true, is that I really wanted to get the Maine way of solving this problem,” Coffin said. “Just get it done.”
And that’s very much what the story portrays, with a can-do attitude and a feeling of a community coming together. The characters in the story are meant to reflect real characters you’d find in Maine — from those who are independent and self-sufficient to loners and everyone in between, including those “who have healthily dependent lives,” Coffin said.
The moral of the story? For Coffin, it’s simple: “Maine will provide.”
“It’s more about giving than anything else — not with calculation and not with a receipt,” Coffin said.
This updated version comes with some subtle changes from the original. Most notably, the reason for the reindeer getting sidelined shifted from pollution to simply getting ill mid-flight.
“I needed to get the reindeer out of the way without having anyone worry about the reindeer,” Coffin explained. With his editor’s suggestion, he illustrated the reindeer too — showing that they were loopy but not direly ill.
The suggestion worked, and the book came together.
Reaction to the book has been positive so far, Coffin said. There was a well-attended book launch party at Left Bank Books in Belfast. Now, he’s looking forward to upcoming book signings.
On Saturday, Coffin will be at The Briar Patch on Central Street in Bangor at 10 a.m. for a book signing where he’ll be drawing cartoons as well.
He’ll also be at the Children’s Book Cellar in Waterville signing books on Dec. 5.