Arthur, Clean Your Room! (Arthur Adventures Series)

Book Description
When Arthur's mother orders him to get rid of some of the old junk cluttering his room, Arthur decides to have a garage sale. But when his first customer, Buster, doesn't have enough money for the toy he wants, a trade is worked out. Soon word spreads that Arthur has great stuff to trade, and by the end of the day, Arthur has gotten rid of all his old junk. His mother is pleased, until she finds out that D.W. is in business too--renting out her room to store all of Arthur's new junk! Arthur, Clean Your Room! comes complete with a page of peel-off stickers to place on words throughout the book and another page of colorful garden stickers to get new readers started writing and illustrating their very own stories about Arthur and D.W.

Card catalog description
His sister D.W. convinces Arthur to have a garage sale after his mother tells him to get rid of the junk in his room, but things do not work out exactly as he had planned.

From the Inside Flap
When Arthur's mother orders him to get rid of some of the old junk cluttering his room, Arthur decides to have a garage sale.  But when his first customer, Buster, doesn't have enough money for the toy he wants, a trade is worked out. Soon word spreads that Arthur has great stuff to trade, and by the end of the day, Arthur has gotten rid of all his old junk. His mother is pleased, until she finds out that D.W. is in business too--renting out her room to store all of Arthur's new junk! Arthur, Clean Your Room! comes complete with a page of peel-off stickers to place on words throughout the book and another page of colorful garden stickers to get new readers started writing and illustrating their very own stories about Arthur and D.W.

About the Author
Marc Brown is best known as the author and illustrator who created the beloved aardvark Arthur.  This popular character was born one night over twenty years ago, when Brown was telling his oldest son, Tolon, a bedtime story.  Most of the stories he told were about animals, but that night the story just happened to be about an aardvark.  Brown has written and illustrated more than fifty Arthur and D.W. (Arthur's little sister) books since then.  He has also illustrated twelve other books with his wife--author, illustrator, and psychologist Laurie Krasny Brown.

As a child, Marc Brown's passion for drawing was encouraged by his grandmother Thora, who saved his artwork in the bottom drawer of her bureau.  "I knew it must be special," recalls Brown, "because she didn't save many things."  His grandmother later provided an education fund that helped Brown pay for art school.  He attended the Cleveland Institute of Art from 1964 to 1969.

Grandma Thora is just one person in Marc Brown's life who has afforded the inspiration for one of his characters.  Many other characters are based on children he knew while he was growing up and going to school in Mill Creek, Pennsylvania.  His sisters--Bonnie, Colleen, and Kimberly--have all served as models for his characters D.W. and Francine.  Brown patterned Buster after Terry Johnson, his best friend in elementary school, while Mr. Ratburn is based on "the meanest algebra teacher ever."

Brown was born in 1946 in Erie, Pennsylvania.  Before he created the Arthur series, he worked at a variety of jobs, including stints as a truck driver, short-order cook, college professor, soda jerk, actor, chicken farmer, and television art director.  Now, in addition to developing the Arthur television series on PBS, Brown continues to create new books both for Random House Children's Publishing and Little, Brown Books for Young Readers.

Marc Brown lives in Hingham, Massachusetts, and Martha's Vineyard with Laurie and their young daughter, Eliza.  He also has two grown sons, Tolon and Tucker.  Brown looks to his three children for inspiration and story ideas.  He also gets many suggestions from children he meets in schools, libraries, and bookstores around the country.  "The most interesting--and the funniest--things," Brown says, "happen in real life."


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Marc Brown's familiar and likable characters have another adventure in this story by the creator of the Author books and TV series. In this episode, Arthur's mother tells him to clean out the junk in his room, and his sister D.W. suggests a garage sale. Arthur sets up shop and all of his friends come by. Buster, Binky, Francine, Muffy and others each like a particular toy of Arthur's and offer to trade one of their toys for his. Before Arthur knows it, he's gotten rid of all his stuff but he now has a pile of "new" stuff. What will his mother say? Don't worry, D.W. has an idea. As Mom inspects Arthur's clean-as-a whistle room, she hears a crash from D.W.'s room. When asked to explain herself, D.W. tells her mom she's started a business renting space in her room and Arthur owes her a dollar. An added bonus in this book is a two-page insert of stickers that kids can use to identify highlighted words in the text and to create their own stories. A clever way to entice children to read and encourage them to try their hand at creative writing.


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