Martina the Beautiful Cockroach

Martina the Beautiful Cockroach
A Cuban Folktale
By: Carmen Agra Deedy
Grades 3-5
FOLK LITERATURE (Folktale)

This is definitely one of my favorite books. I actually plan to purchase this book for my classroom library. The pictures are gorgeous. The pictures are practically 3-D. I feel that students at any age would enjoy this book just because of the pictures and the content. Also it is a folktale and genres of books are discussed in grades 3-5 and this is a book that could be included in the folktale genre. This book just brought me joy and I loved how she valued her family, especially her grandmother. This book was about a female beautiful cockroach who is at the age that she needs to find the one she is going to marry. She goes on the look by sitting on her balcony and the animals come and ask her hand in marriage. One thing of advice her grandmother gave was she needed to pour coffee on each animal that came to ask her hand in marriage to see how they would react. The animals that initially came acted in an angry way and it showed her that she didn't need to marry them and they were not the one for her. At the end she was frustrated but then met a small brown mouse and hesitantly went to pour the coffee on him and he got there first. She had met her match!! She asked him how he knew that is what she was doing and he said he had a Cuban grandmother too. They ended up being together. Again this was a wonderful book and makes me think of my great family at home and the great advice they give me each day because they know what is best for me just as her grandmother knew by pouring the coffee on everyone would show her who she wanted to be with or who she didn't want to be with according to their reaction.