Where the World Ends
Davide Cali and Maria Dek
Princeton Architectural Press

With nothing better to do on a sultry summer’s day but lie around watching and discussing the clouds, why not go on a quest to discover where the world ends. That’s just what three friends Zip, Trik and Flip decide to do in this quirky story, having first packed plenty of peanuts and other essential items such as skis, binoculars, pencils and paper.

En route they stop several times asking for directions and receive a number of less than helpful answers -“Why would you want to go there?”

… “not here for sure”, “You can’t … nobody has ever been there. I forbid you to cross here!” … “at the peak of a nearby mountain” for instance. One more considerate boatman does take them across a lake though, and others are a tad more obliging in their comments.

On trudge the three, meandering, like Cali’s narrative, hither and thither, over hill and down dale,

up mountains and down, through a forest until finally driven by the logic of children at play they find that which they seek …

It’s only by turning to the final endpapers that we see a child-like map of the route the friends have taken.
Yes, the ending is somewhat strange and some may not find it satisfying, although the adventurers certainly did.

Executed in watercolours, Maria Dek’s sunny scenes are delightfully whimsical making every one a place to pause and enjoy its inventiveness.