'Once, and once only, there was a boy whose name was Fizzlebert.' Fizzlebert Stump lives in a travelling circus. But although he gets to hang around with acrobats, play the fool with clowns, and put his head in a lion's mouth every night, he's the only kid there - and he's bored. But then Fizz decides to join a library, and life suddenly gets a lot more exciting when he is kidnapped by a pair of crazed pensioners! Will he ever see the circus again? A story of a boy, a book, some very bad people, some very brave deeds, and the importance of rubber teeth for lions.