"It takes only one halfling bomb, and Offi Numminen's world is turned upside down--or downside up, really, since he lives in a hole in the ground. His goth cardigans and aggressive melancholy set him apart from the other gnomes, as does his decision to fight back against their halfling oppressors. Suddenly Offi is the leader of a band of lovable misfits and outcasts--from a gryphon who would literally kill for omelets, a young dwarf herbalist who is better with bees than his cudgel, to an assertive and cheerful teen witch with a beard as long as her book of curses--all on a journey to the Toot Towers to confront the dastardly villain intent on tearing Pell asunder"--