Gethsarade grew up feeling all alone and out of place. Don't we all. But you know, the trouble with being truly different, is there often simply isn't a way, and one must make it before they can walk it. Gethsarade finally gets into more trouble than his false bravado can handle, and sends him tumbling headwise into a journey that would test everything he is, and everything he isn't. Along the way, he encounters the vile Barrogan Black, a nutria pirat (that's a pirate rat, which is far worse than a regular old pirate) with dwarfism who has a little bit different approach to coping with being different; kill everyone that even snickers at you. Gethsarade's antics and his friends race to save the squirrels of the high flying city of Hesperia, but Gethsarade's identity crisis keeps making things worse instead of better. In the end, Barrogan will force him to decide whether to become the fabled hero Hesperia really needs, or to remain the celebrated phony of his own devising.