Then Edward comes upon a creature that is his polar opposite: Cyrus is a turtle but he too has a neck issue. Other animals have enviable necks so why is his the object of attention all the time? He has, assuredly, a long-lasting problem. It’s not as though Edward hasn’t tried to improve matters he’s adorned the thing with all manner of scarves and ties and attempted to hide himself away but without success. Said neck causes other animals to stare at him wherever he goes. A neck that is too long, too bendy, too narrow, too dopey, too patterned, too stretchy, too high, too lofty: in short too necky. The giraffe in question being Edward his problem coming in the form of his neck. Touches of whimsy abound in this detailed urban landscape especially for those who know how to look for the extraordinary in the seemingly ordinary.įollowing on from their Penguin Problems, Jory John and Lane Smith present Giraffe Problems.

Lane Smith holds up a two-way mirror to Egger’s contemplations with his mixed media images of a boy heading out through the door to wander around his urban environment encountering such oddities as a troubled big-eyed bug missing his friend named Stu or that curved-beaked creature sporting a paper-hat, as well as envisaging eccentricities like eating the cloud-cone as he pauses in a flower-filled patch of green and then, clutching the cone, sings atop a rocky tower Īnd closing with the boy now sleeping, dreaming of tomorrow, happy in the belief that because he’s in it, it will be ‘a great day.’

In this bedtime story, his laid back languorous, rhythmic textual repetition provides both comfort and cheer –seemingly spoken by the mother from the title page bidding her child goodnight and in so doing looking forward. None of us knows what the next day will bring but Eggers’ likelihoods are safe, reassuring, sometimes weird like this something that won’t rhymeĪnd sometimes totally delightful: ‘Tomorrow most likely / there will be a sky / And chances are it will be blue.’ … ‘Tomorrow most likely / you’ll smell the good smell / of an unseen flower you can’t quite name.’ … ‘Tomorrow most likely / you’ll pick up a stone / striped like a spiderweb or maybe a brain.’ Dave Eggers has penned rhyming ponderings upon the possibilities of what tomorrow might have in store.

A Perfect Day by Lane Smith