The book followed the life of a female student named Mui Ee, studying at the fictitious Paya Lebar Junior College in Singapore. The book was a bestseller in Singapore, and was followed by a sequel,
The Teenage Workbook, in 1989. Tan wrote the books while he was an undergraduate law student at the
National University of Singapore. The two books sold over 50,000 copies. In 2015,
The Teenage Textbook was selected by
The Business Times as one of the Top 10 English Singapore books from 1965 to 2015, alongside titles by
Arthur Yap and
Daren Shiau. Following the death of Adrian Tan in July 2023, the Memorial Edition of the two books were published by
Landmark Books on the following month. ==Adaptations==