Originally published: August 13, 2020
Author: Matt Haig
Genres: Science fiction, Fantasy Fiction, Philosophical fiction
Number of pages: 304
The Midnight Library was my first book from Matt Haig. My friend once said she was reading a book about a girl who wants to commit suicide and ends up in a midnight library, where she can choose where to go in the past and make a different decision. That intrigued me.
Imagine someone hands you your book of regrets and lets you travel into the past to change the things you’ve regretted all these years.
If you’ve ever had these thoughts, The Midnight Library by Matt Haig is truly for you. It teaches us how to stay strong, let go of regret, and reminds us that it’s never too late to change our lives.
Synopsis
Matt Haig’s The midnight library tells a story of 35 year old Nora Seed, who had a difficult childhood due to her unhealthy relationship with her father, she lost connection with her brother and with her best friend, who lived in Australia. After her mother’s death, Nora left her ex-fiancé, Dan, two days before they were supposed to get married. As if all this was not enough she loses her job and the only piano student, she used to teach. Nora returns home to discover her beloved cat has died in a tragic accident. Overwhelmed by grief and hopelessness, she falls into deep depression and decides to commit suicide to escape the pain.
Between life and death, Nora finds herself in a midnight library, with her school librarian, Miss Elm.This figure serves as her guide, walking her through shelves filled with books—each representing a life Nora could have lived if she had made different choices.
Full summary
The book starts with a story of a younger Nora, at school in the town of Bedford. That is 19 years before the day when Nora would decide to commit suicide. She is a smart girl and she also started to become a successful swimmer. She liked to play chess with the librarian Mrs Elm, but on that day their game is interrupted with a phone call informing about the death of her father.
19 years later, on the day she decided to end her life, she lost her job at the music shop “Theory of strings”, his only student Leo whom she was teaching piano lessons, and even her neigbor whom she was helping no longer needed her help. She wanders in the town thinking about her ex-fiancé, Dan, her only best friend Izzy, now living in Australia, her brother who she did not call for ages.
She feels desperately alone, depressed and as if that was not enough she comes home to find out that her cat died in a car accident.
She returns home, takes a lot of pills, and leaves a suicide note. Right at midnight, between life and death Nora finds herself in a library with endless moving shelves of unlabeled books. Mrs Elm was there too, and she guided Nora and explained where she was. On one of the shelves she saw a book that was different then others The first book Nora picks is the “Book of Regrets.” Its chapters are numbered according to her age—1, 2, 5—and as she gets older, the chapters grow longer. Some regrets show up across multiple chapters, including:
– “I regret leaving the band “Labyrinth.” I betrayed my brother.” – “I regret spending too much on social media.” – “I regret not vising my best friend Izzy in Australia – ” I regret giving up on learning Spanish.” – “I regret not finishing the novel I started at university.”
Starting around the age of 34, many of her regrets revolve around her boyfriend, Dan. She regrets breaking up with him, not opening a pub with him in a small village, and being too hard on him.
Mrs Elms explains to Nora that these books are in fact portals to different lives that Nora could have lived if she made different choices. Every decision leads to different results and she could visit any of them and see how her life would turn out.
The first life she visits places her in a small village where she and Dan run the pub she had once dreamed of. At first, it seemed like everything she ever wanted. But as time passes, Dan feels distant, their relationship is strained, and, to make things worse, she discovers he’s had an affair with someone named Erin. Nora realizes that even if she had chosen a life with Dan, it wouldn’t have worked—they simply aren’t meant to be together. And once in her real life she already understood it and made a decision to break up.
Next she asks Mrs Elm to be taken to a reality where her cat Voltaire is alive. She goes back to basically her same life and goes on looking for the cat, but she eventually finds that the cat is dead under her bed. Sad and confused Nora returns back to the library.
Mrs Elms explains that even if the car was not in the accident it would still die, because of the cat’s heart condition. The cat likely went outside to die. Nora was a good cat owner, it is just that no matter how hard you try and care there are things in life that just happen and cannot be changed.
Next, Nora wants to see a life where she decided to move to Australia to live with her best friend Izzy. She is transported to Australia, Sydney. Nora was swimming in the pool enjoying the nice weather but she had no clie where exactly she was and where was Izzy. She finds her address in one of her emails and heads home. When she returned to her apartment she meets Jojo her roommate who tells her that Izzy died in a car accident a month after they arrived in Australia.
In another life, Nora becomes a swimming champion but struggles with a difficult relationship with her father. In yet another, she moves to Arctics, to face a fear agains the bears.
These experiences help Nora—and the reader—understand that no life is perfect. Dreaming of a different path doesn’t guarantee happiness. Every life comes with its own set of challenges, and the key is learning how to face them. After all, you only die once—but you live every single day.
How Does The Midnight Library End
At 21 minutes past midnight, Nora came back to life. She gathered her strength, got out of bed, and tried to make a phone call but couldn’t. Instead, she managed to open the door and knock on her neighbor’s door. He called the doctors, and Nora was taken to the hospital.
Though her life remained the same, she decided to accept it and live fully. Soon, her brother visited her in the hospital, she reconnected with her best friend Izzy, and she resumed her piano lessons. She even found inspiration to write a song. Nora also began volunteering to help animals and considered asking out the cute runner she often saw—who turned out to be a doctor.
In the final moments of the book, Nora finds Miss Elm and plays chess with her, just as she used to when she was a teenager.
My Honest Review of The Midnight Library
What I loved most about this book is how it expresses emotions that so many people feel—but rarely speak about. If we all shared those feelings with each other—if we realized how emotionally similar we really are—it would make things a little easier.
Nora was lonely. That was the main thing that led her to depression and thoughts of suicide. If she had someone who truly cared—a friend, a boyfriend, anyone—she might have felt loved and appreciated. That’s what I took from this book: it’s essential to keep the people you care about close. For Nora, it was her brother and her best friend. Sometimes, that’s all we really need—someone to share our day with, talk about our failures, feel listened to, and feel loved.
Even if you regret something, you don’t have to bury yourself in that. You don’t have to sit in the dark, feeling sorry for your whole life. What you need is the ability to let go, to learn from your past, and to grow from it. Matt Haig’s point is that we are the painter of your our lives—so why not paint it with color, paint it boldly. If you don’t like something, change it. Move. Be brave.
Life isn’t defined by your past mistakes. You can always improve, always grow, and always learn. My personal review for The midnight library by Matt Haig is is 8 out of 10.
Book Similar to The Midnight Library
If you enjoyed The Midnight Library, you might also appreciate Veronika Decides to Die by Paulo Coelho. This novel explores similar themes of mental health, personal struggle, and the search for meaning, offering a thought-provoking journey about life’s choices and second chances.
