This is the first sequel to Bridge of Birds, Hughart’s
delightful tale of Number Ten Ox the peasant and Master Li Kao, the sage with a
slight flaw in his character. This book takes place a few years after
its predecessor; one gathers that Ox has been living with Li Kao in
Peking and that they’ve had a number of adventures in the meantime.

In this book, Master Li and Number Ten Ox are summoned to a distant
valley which centuries ago was the home of the fiendish and sadistic Laughing
Prince. A monk has been found dead, apparently of fright, strange
sights have been seen, and the local abbot is afraid that the Laughing
Prince and his followers have returned.

Like its predecessor, The Story of the Stone is a skillful
mixture of Chinese life, legend, and myth, well-leavened with humor.
I’ve never thought it quite as good as its predecessor, and on this
reading I set out to find out why. It turns out that there are three
related reasons.

The first reason is a difference in structure. Bridge of
Birds is essentially episodic in nature, though the episodes are joined
by an over-arching narrative. Moreover, all of the episodes share a single
narrative and comic structure. The Story of the Stone is much
less episodic, and the storyline is rather more complex.

The difference in structure has two effects, my second and third
reasons. The first effect is that while there’s much to laugh at in
The Story of the Stone, the comedy is incidental rather than
essential–it could easily have been left out without changing the story
significantly. The second effect is that the book is much less
fun to read aloud–which is how I first tried to read it.
(Bridge of Birds reads aloud marvelously.)

And that’s what left the bad taste in my mouth–I was expecting a
delightful, joyous read-aloud, and I didn’t get one.

This time around I resolved to just let the book do its thing, without
comparing it to its predecessor, and I’ve decided that it’s really much
better than I’d given it credit for–that it’s a good, well-crafted tale.
It still isn’t the book Bridge of Birds is; but then, few are.