Sneha Jaiswal (Twitter | Instagram)
It was only after I went online to add ‘Quiet Girl in a Noisy World: An Introvert’s Story’ on Goodreads that I realized creator Debbie Tung’s work isn’t new to me! In July 2024, I read ‘Happily Ever After & Everything In Between’ and rated it 2.5 stars. It’s just that, ugh… maybe if I had remembered, I might not have downloaded this title. Although on the other hand, I do believe in giving creators 2nd, 3rd, or how many ever chances, since many tend to get better with experience, others get inconsistent, and some probably get worse.
But ‘Quiet Girl in a Noisy World’ is Debbie Tung’s debut book, a collection of comics offering a look of her life as an introvert. So I am not very surprised that I liked it even lesser than a later work. Sure, it’s got cutesy artwork – the illustrations are black-and-white, simple, and adorably doodle style. But the content is extremely repetitive, with most panels being a variation of ‘oh I don’t like talking or meeting people’.
We see enough memes or funny little videos on introverts online – you know those clips where an introvert will receive a ‘sorry the party has been cancelled’ text from a friend and they’ll jump out of joy? As an introvert, I definitely find some of them funny and relatable. But this book doesn’t do much more.
I was hoping for a slightly more story-like structure or at least some. Something more than just Debbie being awkward around people or just praising how nice it is to just be home, rolled up nicely on the couch with a book (nearly every reader will find that joy relatable). But after a point… what else?
For example, in the earlier pages of ‘Quiet Girl in a Noisy World’, the doodles indicate Debbie to be an introvert with few friends who is likely single. Suddenly, out of nowhere, an extroverted but supportive boyfriend starts to pop in the panels, which is sweet, but then it would’ve been nice if the panels showed how they started dating.
Ultimately, the reader’s reaction to Debbie Tung’s ‘Quiet Girl in a Noisy World’ would be based on what they expect out of it and what is delivered. For me, the gap between ‘expectation’ and ‘reality’ was high. But now that you’ve come so far into this book review, you have a better idea about what to expect: lots of doodles about despising social interactions, outdoor activities, and social gatherings. And if you don’t mind an overload of them, maybe this will be a 5 on 5 for you.
I think this is a good little comic for teen readers who are introverted, and maybe I’d have loved reading it in 2007. But this book was published a decade later.
Rating: 2 on 5 stars. ‘Quiet Girl in a Noisy World is on Kindle Unlimited.
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