The Giraffe's Neck (Der Hals der Giraffe)

She has survived a change of political system, lost her husband to ostrich breeding and her daughter to a life in the USA. Inge Lohmark, who has taught sport and biology for 30 years, knows how to adapt to changing circumstances – and that only the fittest survive. But now the powers that be in the little town in Western Pomerania where she teaches want to close her school. What’s more, her teaching methods come under scrutiny and, out of the blue, she falls in love with one of her pupils. Serious cracks begin to appear in Lohmark’s neat world view and her belief in biologism.

Judith Schalanksy tells of a time of transition: the old order is gone, the new one remains foreign. She writes about people trying to save what cannot be saved and about ossification and regeneration in the years following the fall of the wall.