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This puts a twist on the traditional stone soup story. Instead of hungry strangers convincing the village people to share small amounts of food to make a meal everyone will enjoy, a fisherman is tricked by 3 brothers. This book is said to be the real story of the stone soup invented in China. A fisherman hired 3 brothers to help him with his work. Truth be told the fishermen always makes the brothers do all the work. One day while stopping for lunch, the realized they had forgotten their cooking pot. The 3 clever brothers decided to make stone soup and trick the fisherman into doing all the work. While the brothers give the fishermen work to do they put in real fish, vegetables and egg into the soup tricking him into thinking it was made with just stones. The stone soup turns out to be delicious and the fisherman continues to share the secrets of how he invented stone soup. This is a clever book filled with lots of humor and enjoyable to read. I love how the number 3 was used to represent the brothers and the number of stones put in the soup. I found myself so into reading the story that I did not look at the illustrations and had to go back to find that the brothers put food in the soup. The illustrator tricked me as the brothers tricked the fisherman. ( )

When the Chang brothers and the narrator stop fishing for lunch and realize they forgot the cooking pot. The youngest, Kuai, instead digs a hole and proceeds to instruct his companions on how to make stone soup.
Magic in the stones, number 3 used with the three brothers.
Medium: watercolor

The Real Story of Stone Soup by Ying Chang Compestine is a cute retelling of the traditional story of stone soup. I loved the illustrations in this book - beautifully painted water color pictures. I also liked the humor in the book. The illustrations depicted a different story than the words, allowing the readers to make their own inferences about what was actually happening. This is a good example of irony in the story. I loved that at the end of the book there is a recipe for how to make stone soup. A good way to incorporate this story in the class room would be to make stone soup as a class. ( )

Summary:
A stingy fisherman always makes his three young helpers do all his work. One day he gets on to the boys for forgetting to provide lunch. They told him not to worry because they could make stone soup. The boys dug a hole and filled it with water and "flavored" stones. They tricked the fisherman into making bowls and chopsticks, and fetching salt and sesame oil. While he's busy, they stir in bird eggs, add wild vegetables, and slip fish into the soup. By the time the old man returns, they have enough food to feed a king.

Personal Reaction:
I only read this book a few years ago when my cousin asked me to read it to him. I found it very enjoyable and love how the tale is that this is how Egg Drop Soup came about.

Classroom Extension Ideas:
1.) Have the students help the teameacher and see if they could make their own stone soup. ( )