📖 Novel of the Week: The Midnight Library by Matt Haig

 

Nora Seed is convinced she failed at living: she didn't become the Olympic swimmer her father wanted her to be nor pursue the rockstar career with her brother Joe. She studied Philosophy and yet she's working in a music shop...wait, scratch that, she was fired from that job earlier today.

She didn't marry Dan and went living in the countryside with him, her elderly neighbor doesn't need her to collect his medicines anymore and the only living being in her life is Voltaire, her cat...but where is it hiding?

Profoundly unhappy with how her life turned out and already under anti-depressant therapy, Nora decides to kill herself...looks like she's not talented in dying either, as she ends up in the Midnight Library and the person welcoming her and explaining what is this place is no other than her former high school librarian, Mrs. Elm.

The Midnight Library is a sort of limbo, a place between life and death, where all the possible lives Nora could have lived are written in books; and Nora has the opportunity to live any of those lives. If she happens to like it, she'll stay there and eventually forget about her original life and the Midnight Library...if she's unsatisfied with it, she'll return to the Library and could pick out another book.

With infinite possibilities, who will Nora choose to be?

👍👎My Thoughts

The Midnight Library has a concept similar to the movie 'Sliding Doors', focusing on how one's life could have been if they've taken a different decision at any point in their lives: how Nora's life would be like if she had never stopped swimming or if she worked harder in becoming a musician? Or what if she'd taken a completely different path and became, say...a scientist?

As Nora enters the Midnight Library, she is presented with the "book of regrets" and as she tries a life after another, all the regrets fade away, but that doesn't mean she'll be satisfied with the chosen life...she'll just tick them out.

The 'inconvenient truth' both Nora and the reader come to realize is that a different life doesn't necessarily mean it's going to be a better one; as a matter of fact, most of Nora's parallel lives were filled with misfortunes and sadness, reason why she'd always go back to the Library.

It was interesting to experience all the different lives and see how an initially skeptical and hopeless Nora came to realize she is the one with the power to change her life and, ultimately, life is not meant to be understood but lived, as Mrs. Elm told her.

This story is so fluid, easy to follow and the author's style is super clear that I've finished reading it in the blink of an eye.

This book will surely make the reader reflect on their lives and what could be different if they took different choices, but I think it's mostly a book that helps to appreciate the positive aspects of our own lives, the good things we have done, and the amazing people we've met so far.

My vote: 8/10

Ph: sevenoaksbookshop.co.uk