[1] An E-book edition was published by Gollancz's SF Gateway imprint on September 29, 2011 as part of a general release of de Camp's works in electronic form.

[2][3] Soldier and aspiring scholar Thorolf Zigramson of Rhaetia is out fishing when he encounters the proverbial damsel in distress in the form of Yvette, fugitive Countess of Grintz from the neighboring kingdom of Carinthia.

To hide the countess from her enemy Thorolf takes her to the Rhaetian capital of Zurshnitt, where his enchanter friend Doctor Bardi undertakes to magically disguise her features.

Parlaying his membership in the troll band into a bid to reverse his fortune, Thorolf uses their secret tunnels to spy on Orlandus and ultimately to kill the wizard and rescue Yvette.

Sharing a mutual attraction, Thorolf and Yvette have during their adventures alternately quarreled and reconciled, coming close at times to a physical relationship only to be thwarted by circumstances.

The Pixilated Peeress and its predecessor The Incorporated Knight are both set in the medieval era of an alternate world sharing the geography of our own, but in which a "Napolitanian" (Neapolitan) empire filled the role of Rome and no universal religion like Christianity ever arose, leaving its nations split among competing pagan sects.

Sharon Miller, writing for United Press International, states that the book demonstrates de Camp "has come as close as anyone to perfecting" what she calls "light-hearted fantasy."

[1] The main plot device of bickering male and female protagonists not destined for a happy ending together is featured in several late de Camp novels, notably The Prisoner of Zhamanak (1982), The Bones of Zora (1983), and The Incorporated Knight (1987).

Thorolf's method of dragon hunting echoes that employed in "King Fusinian the Fox and the Teeth of Grimnor," an inset tale in de Camp's The Goblin Tower (1968).

The plot feature of the protagonist gaining sanctuary with a nonhuman race, facing an unwelcome marriage, and being saved by the reluctant bride's betrothed is reused from de Camp's much earlier short story "The Blue Giraffe" (1939).