The Talking Eggs

By: Robert D. San Souci
Illustrations By: Jerry Pinkney
Fairy Tale/Folk Tale
~This is a fun and silly tale about a young girl named Blanche who lives poorly with her widowed mother and mean sister Rose. Blanches mother and sister were very mean to her and made her do all the chores around the house and cook all the meals. One day Blanche is summoned to go get some cool drinking water from the well. While she is there, an old woman with a black is terribly thirsty and asks for water. Blanch gives the old woman some water and heads back to the house. By the time she got there, the water was not cool anymore and Blanche was beaten and scolded by her mother and sister. Blanche runs off crying in the woods, where she meets that same old woman again. The kind woman offers Blanche a place to stay for the night and some supper. Blanche and the old woman set off in the woods. As they travel along, the old woman tells Blanche not to laugh at anything she sees. While Blanche thought this was an odd thing to ask, she does what the woman says. As they reach the womans house, she sees a two headed cow with twisted horns, dozens of chickens of every color running about with multiple legs. Blanche obeys the woman and does not laugh when she sees these silly creatures. They continue into the womans house where she asks Blanche to start a fire, and a stew with a tiny bone. While Blanche doesnt think this will make a hearty stew, as soon as she drops it in the water it turns to a thick delicous stew. The old woman then asks her to grind one grain of rice, as she does the single grain turns into plenty. Blanche and the old woman eat their supper, then the woman takes off her head to brush her hair! Blanche still does not laugh. Blanche heads for bead and the next day she does everything that woman asks her to do. She tells Blanche to go to the chicken coop and only take the eggs that shout "take me" and leave the ones that say "leave me here." She goes to collect the eggs, and all the fancy eggs covered in jules and gold were saying "leave me." Blanche instead takes the plain eggs that said "take me." The old woman told her to hurry home now and before she gets home to toss the eggs over her left shoulder and she will get a surprise. She again listens to the woman and they eggs become jewles, gold, fancy clothes, a carriage, and even a horse to draw the carriage. Blanche heads home with all of her new fine things and her mother and sister are very jealous. The mother tells Rose to go find the old woman and get fancy things so they can leave Blanche and head to the city. Rose meets the old woman, but laughs at her animals and does not obey her. Rose then takes all of the fancy eggs and when she throws them over her shoulder they turn into, frogs, wasps and even a great grey wolf, that chase Rose and her mother out of town. When they returned back to the cabin, Blanche had left with her fancy things to start a better life in the city.
~I love this book becuase it teaches a lesson about being kind to others and how you will get things in return if you are. It is fun and silly and would be good to read to a classroom. For older students i would write the different characters on index cards and give students a role. I will have split up the book into roles and have them written out. Students will then do a readers theatre on the book and read their roles aloud to work on reading fluency and get to experience an enjoyable book.