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Publisher - Clarion Books
Ages 3-6
“Christelow’s watercolor and pencil illustrations show
great energy and movement, peppered with just the right amount of
silliness.” —ALA Booklist
IRA/CBC Children’s Choice—2001
Other books about the monkeys...
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| The Story: |
The five little monkeys
and Mama all know,
the old car has had it.
It really must go.
But how will they sell it
and buy one that's new?
It's dirty and smelly!
Oh, what can they do?
They wash that old car,
every window and tire.
It's ready! It's perfect!
All they need is a buyer.
So open the book,
to see how the tale ends
for the five little monkeys
and a few bright green friends.
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| Where did you get the idea?: |
Some car-crazy kids at
a school in Virginia gave me the idea for this book! They wanted
me to draw a story about the monkeys and a car. So I drew the car
and I drew the five little monkeys. Then I asked, "Now what should
they do?" There were lots of ideas. As with all stories, one idea
led to another idea which led to another idea. First, I wrote Five
Little Monkeys With Nothing to Do which doesn't have a car
in it at all. Then I wrote Five Little Monkeys Wash the Car.
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| Tidbits: |
When I first wrote this story, it was not in rhyme. But every time
I read it, I thought, "These words want to rhyme!" So I wrote the
story in rhyme and showed it to my writer's group. They said, "That
sounds terrible! You shouldn't write that story in rhyme!" I felt
very discouraged--only for a few days. Then I got back to work. I
bought a Thesaurus. I bought several rhyming dictionaries. I worked
all summer on many, many drafts. Finally my writer's group said, "It
sounds good! You're right. This book was meant to be in rhyme!"
The Illustrations:
Do you know what was difficult about doing the illustrations in this book?
Painting the car! Once I figured out how the monkeys were going to decorate
the car, I had to make sure I painted the car with the same designs in each
picture.
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The drawings are done with a very dark pencil.
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I painted the color with Holbein acrylic gouache. I used acrylic
gouache instead of regular gouache because I wanted to paint
colors on top of colors. If I used regular water-soluble gouache,
the colors on top would mix with the colors underneath.
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| Other
Books About the Monkeys: |
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