My niece loves to read and one of her favorite books is Tales of Despereaux. I was going to do the books in fondant and have all the books off center but the fondant got too hard because I added gum tex. So I just used buttercream. It was extremely hot and humid when I made this cake, which is why it is so shinny. I lost power for a day so I lost allot of decorating time. Once I let go of how I wanted to do it and looked at it from an 8 year old's point of view, things began to run more smoothly. Next time I will use merange powder to avoid the buttercream from drooping. The mouse was done with fondant. It's was difficult to get him to look like despereaux, that was as close as I could get; it was fun making him.