In old Moscow lived a little girl named Sasha and her grandfather, a boxmaker.  Sasha loves her rag doll, but one day it falls prey to mice.  What can Grandfather Boxer do? "Wait! Sasha, I can carve!" he says. I'll carve you a doll - a thumbling doll - from a scrap of wood."  Sasha paints the doll to look like a matrioshka, "a little mother," and loves this doll too. Pleased, Grandfather Boxer carves another doll of the same shape in which to store the first.
Unfortunately, two matrioshkas are not enough, for a mouse can easily steal two tiny dolls in one, and a rat can abscond with three.  A cat can knock over four, and what are five to the Tsar's cavalry!  How many matrioshkas will Sasha need to know that her thumbling doll is secure?
Happily, Grandfather Boxer is willing to carve on and on, until Sasha has just the right number of dolls--and the dolls have worked their magic--in Jana Dillon's heartwarming inter-generational story, lavishly and lovingly illustrated by Deborah Nourse Lattimore.