When the Wind Blew

Extreme weather isn’t limited to the real world—it hits the country of nursery rhymes, too, as a gale breaks a famous bough and deposits a rock-a-bye baby on an equally famous shoe. “The woman and children who lived in the shoe/ Were nestled inside, but they knew what to do.” They set off to return the baby, discovering missing mittens (and some guilty kittens), a pail, a misplaced sheep that belongs to a girl named Mary... and that’s just the beginning. Barrette (Never Ask a Bear) sets the story in a fairytale European village with tiled roofs, a castle, and rolling hills; she captures the storm’s force with swirling skirts, waving branches, and flying coins. As in 2001’s If the Shoe Fits, Jackson puts nursery world elements together like a crossword puzzle, assembling smart rhymes (“The coins had been swept from the king’s counting room,/ And the woman surmised he’d be missing them soon”) and clever scenarios, although a moral about acquisitiveness (“From kitten to king, they examined the cost/ Of constantly grasping at things that are lost”) has a tacked-on feeling. Ages 4–7. (Mar.)