Author converts fears to giggles

Doggy dentist aims to calm young readers

Chico’s First Trip to the Dentist

Jen Dafoe Fitzhenry & Whiteside

A Sarnia, Ont., author’s children’s book that aims to ease their fears about visits to the dentist will be distributed across the country.

Publisher Fitzhenry & Whiteside has picked up Jen Dafoe’s book Chico’s First Trip to the Dentist and will distribute it through Shopper’s Drug Marts and Loblaws stores across Canada.

“I’m ecstatic,” says Dafoe, who has been selling and distributing the book herself since it was launched in 2014.

“I’m happy because I know how many young children it’s going to help to take that fear away with information that accurate and up to date.

“If I can take away all those fears and anxieties and replace them with education, smiles and giggles, I’ve done my job.”

Dafoe wrote the book after consulting several leading dentists, among them her own dentists, Dr. Mario Moscone and Dr. Silvio Ferrera of Sarnia, London family dentist Dr. Karin Van Rysik, Dr. Raymond Lee, director of children’s dentistry at London Health Sciences Centre, and Dr. David Farkou, a dentist at Sick Kids Hospital in Toronto.

The book was illustrated by U.S. illustrator Evan Shoman.

Fitzhenry has published 4,000 copies of the book, to sell for $12.95.

The star of the book, Dafoe’s friend’s dog Chico, guides young readers along as he learns about dental tools and practices.

Dafoe has already sold more than 2,000 copies of the self-published book online, through independent book stores, Indigo, in hospital gift shops and through a major medical supplies company, Patterson Dental.

The 50-year-old former social worker says she drew on her own medical experiences and observations for inspiration to create the book.

Dafoe is working on a couple of new books, including a visit by Chico to an emergency ward, which she hopes the publisher will want to publish, instead of funding the printing with her own money.