A QUIET GIRL

The world is full of wonders—but you have to be really quiet to appreciate them.

Mary is very quiet. She hears things no one else can: a buzzing dragonfly, a sleeping dog, a creaking tree. When she speaks, her parents and brother don’t hear her, though they’re usually too busy with activities or plugged-in devices anyway. Even when Mary raises her voice, she has trouble being heard. So she becomes even quieter. Suddenly, an enriched world opens to her senses: Mary sees, smells, and feels phenomena she never experienced before. Mary’s family, still engrossed in pastimes and electronics, barely see her; Mary herself feels she doesn’t exist. She goes unnoticed for a while, but soon the family realizes Mary’s “disappeared” and search everywhere. Eventually, the family falls silent, too; for the first time, they listen and hear. Only then do they realize that Mary’s among them—and permanently adopt her new method for engaging with the world. This gentle Australian import exhorts readers to listen, pay attention, and, sometimes, unplug, but some children may be unsettled by the notion that if they tend toward quietude, they may go unheeded in their families. The delicate, sweet line illustrations present brown-haired Mary and her family with beige skin and also depict creative ideas for recycling plastic bottles. A spread with simple mindfulness tips concludes the book.

A cautionary tale about listening closely in order to discover the world’s pleasures.