The Jade Stone: A Chinese Folktale

The Jade Stone: A Chinese Folktale

Adapted by: Caryn Yacowitz

Illustrator: Ju-Hong Chen

Ages: K-5

Rating: 4 Stars

Summary: Chan Lo, a stone carver, is brought before the Great Emperor of all China to create a dragon of wind and fire out a beautiful piece of jade. There is a huge problem. Chan Lo’s carvings are what they want to be, and the piece of jade wants to be carp fish swimming. Chan Lo is sentenced to punishment, but the Great Emperor dreams of the fish and comes to realize what the stone was meant to be.

This Chinese Folktale was extremely enjoyable to read and I shared it with a couple children who thought the same thing.  I loved the water color on rice paper paintings on each of the pages that help to explain the story. The paintings are so detailed but simple at the same time which makes them so intriguing to look at. An interesting detail from this book is that on the first couple of pages there are drawings of each of the characters and their names as they appear in the book. This helped me, as a reader, know what to look for and keep track of the characters on the pages. The only downfall of this book was that there was so much text on one page. I feel that the text could have been spread out over more pages and then there could have been more beautiful pictures to go along with them.

This book could be appropriate for all age levels especially when talking about fairytales or folktales. It is really interesting to see how these types of stories are portrayed in different countries to help us gain an understanding of their cultures.