Book Description

Sweet Tooth can usually be seen with a glass jar of candies clutched between his hands as he goes about whatever business he has with other Trolls in the forested, swampy lowland along the Leaf River just before it passes Petal, Mississippi. He's a Sugar Troll, the first of several dozen Troll Tribes to settle here to escape the Civil War's destruction. The Sugar Trolls lived along the Appomattox River in Virginia for decades. They quickly learned that the land they settled in Mississippi shares an important characteristic with the land they left in Virginia - mosquitoes. Three seasons a year the air is thick with mosquitoes. Trolls barter, they have no money. Trolls who know how to make flyswatters swap them for vegetables or fruit, or sewing patches on shirts. As Sweet Tooth's Great Grandfather, Tooth Ache, told him one day shortly after moving to Mississippi: "Our muscles know how to make flyswatters. Our minds know how many flyswatters we must make if we want to make more flyswatters. Our stomachs tell us how many flyswatters we must make and sell if we want to eat. If we can make them in Virginia, we can make them in Mississippi."