The prosaic and law-abiding inhabitants of Lud-in-the-Mist, a city located at the confluence of the rivers Dapple and Dawl, in the state of Dorimare, must contend with the influx of fairy fruit and the effect of the inhabitants of the bordering land of Faerie, whose presence and very existence they had sought to banish from their rational lives.

When the denial proves futile, their mayor, the respectable Nathaniel Chanticleer, finds himself involved reluctantly with the conflict and obliged to change his conventional personal life and disregard the traditions of Lud-in-the-Mist to find a reconciliation.