Matt Haig writes great books. We all know that. What I love about Matt's books are that he picks something thats very different and makes it into a great story - sometimes I'm a little unsure of Matt's topic choice, mostly because they're not very 'me' books, but always, without fail, I love them and don't want to put them down. The Midnight library is no exception. Matt clearly cares passionately about mental health and that is apparent in the book - Im not sure I'd redo anything in the past, but it really got me thinking and has stuck with me since. Thanks for another number 1 bestseller for peak season in bookselling!

We all have regrets, and at the time of writing this (July 2020) I have had way too much time to look back on my life so far and to wonder at what I could have done differently. This was a very timely read for me. At the start of the novel the protagonist, Nora, decides to take her own life, but this is where her life, or rather lives begin. Haig imagines that in the space between life and death, there exists a library containing every possible life that she could have lived, had she made different decisions. She is able to 'try on' many different versions of herself and learns along the way that much of what she had spent her life regretting, did not necessarily make her any happier. I loved this book. Both positive and life-affirming and when I had finished it, I have to say I had a big smile on my face!

We all live with regrets and what if's in our lives but what if you could see those other lives you could have had if you made a different choice? And would you be happier?
This is the premise for Matt Haig's new novel.
When Nora hits rock bottom and decides to end her life she ends up in a library full of books full of lives she could have had if she had made different choices in her life.
This book is beautifully and thoughtfully written and is a wonderful examination of how regret can eat at you and stop you from making the most of the life you have in front of you.
I haven't read any of Matt Haig's non fiction works but I have heard about how much they have helped people and I think this new novel will do that too.

The most beautiful book I've read this year. Matt Haig easily manages to find access to topics that are still stigmatized. From the first to the very last page Haig has a special way of telling stories. This fascinating novel has filled my heart with hope and a new way to face regrets.

I absolutely adored this book. 😍 I read it so quickly, but I suppose the short chapters helped 😂 It’s a beautiful, enchanting and thought-provoking story. I loved the idea of the midnight library; a place between life and death. A place that gives Nora the opportunity to travel into parallel universes based on her different life choices.
It explores the endless possibilities that life holds for Nora and really makes for a reflective and inspiring story. Actually, it’s a profoundly philosophical view on life and death. Its an incredible feeling when you deeply connect with a book.💕I found Nora engaging and her journey was painful yet inspiring. The ending was so poignant - no spoilers here.🤭

What I love about Haig is his eloquent insight into the human condition and always with a sprinkle of magic. It got me thinking about my own life choices and the classic “what ifs”. BUT the grass isn’t always greener and I wouldn’t be who I am today. It’s a reminder to appreciate every moment, even the tough ones.
“You don’t have to understand life. You just have to live it.” 🙌

(btw - my book is full of tabs. Talk about a quotable book 😉)

Highly recommend THE MIDNIGHT LIBRARY folks.🙋🏼‍♀️ It’s a relatable, perceptive and life affirming book that will stay with me, like many of Haigs books.

I LOVED this book, so very, very much and couldn’t put it down!
The characters are brilliantly balanced-you feel everything for them, good and bad. Even with Nora being the central character, ever other character is equally important, interesting and engaging.
The pacing is spot on and it is a page turner.
It is incredibly life affirming and heartwarming and I’ll be recommending to all my friends.
Having had a few of Matt Haig’s books bought for me previously this is the first one I have read and I’m now going to go read the rest.

I love that Matt Haig takes quite complex ideas and makes them incredibly readable. And The Midnight Library is exactly the same.
Nora decides that life isn’t worth living and takes an overdose. She arrives in The Midnight Library where all the books are versions of her life and she has to decide which once, if any, she wants to remain in.
A lovely story!

Matt Haig writes interesting and engaging characters who you end up caring about!

This book starts with the main character in a dark place, but takes her on a fantasy journey that is just the right side of unhinged / unbelievability - within the world the author has taken you into.

Recommended!

This book is brilliant. That is not to say that is is always a cheery story as it deals with mental illness and the survival (or not) of Nora, the key character,. However, Matt Haig has written something remarkable. A thoughtful, clever, measured, thought-provoking and completely meaningful novel which could not fail to touch and uplift everyone who reads it.

I seem to be late to the party again with Matt Haig’s latest book The Midnight library. This is the first book I have read by the author and it certainly won’t be my last.
Nora Seed is depressed, unemployed and grieving over the loss of her cat. She has also lost contact with her brother who she had differences with. Nora has regrets and wished she had done things differently. She hasn’t got anything else to live for. So, she commits suicide. But instead of being alive or dead, she arrives at the Midnight Library where she meets Mrs Elm the librarian. Each book is about her life, the choices she did made her regrets and the choices she could have made. With Mrs Elm giving her guidance. Nora re-lives some of them lives to find out what really makes her happy and what she must live for. On her journey she meets eclectic group of characters. That gives the reasons to live.
Wow The Midnight Library by Matt Haig is a very thought provoking book that will stay with me for a long time. Not only is a literary fiction book but it is a self-help book. It is very cleverly written. For me personally after reading this book made me think of things differently than before. You get one life you need to live it. 5 stars from me.

I have read a few of Matt Haig's books before and enjoyed them so I had high hopes for this book - all of which were met and exceeded! Such a fun yet illuminating and inspirational read.

Wouldn't we all love to do something differently? Haig explores the impact of regrets and the unrealistic expectations that we often place on ourselves and the impact this can have on our mental health. As someone who is guilty of this (aren't we all) this book really opened my eyes and helped me to be kind to myself. Loved it!

5 stars!

Oh wow! I cannot begin to tell you just how special this book is! Nora Seed & her story has the power to both save and change lives, as well as giving hope & a new perspective to many.

I am already a fan of Mat't's work, but for me The Midnight Library has taken it to a whole new level. I fell in love with Nora and her story. We meet Nora, who it is fair to say, is not in a good place. She is completely at the end of her tether. Shortly into her story we are introduced to the midnight library. A place that will allow her to take stock of her life and the choices she has made.

Argh, this is so hard to write, as I am itching to talk about so many aspects of the story, but to do so would be completely unfair to anyone who hasn't read it.

Let's just say that as Nora, via the library, looks back at what has been or could have been, I found a character who I began to care for very much. Perhaps this is partially as her exploration opened my mind to explore more of my 'what if's'. In places it felt more like I was reading non fiction, and I became completely absorbed, I actually found that I didn't want the book to end. I wanted to know more, and perhaps have more time to think about me and my life too.

Powerful, emotional, and beautifully written I want to shout about it from rooftops! Matt, thank you for writing it. Nora is a character I will carry with me for a long time to come.

Nora Seed feels she has nothing to live for - relationships have failed, she's lost her job, and her cat has died. In the Midnight Library she finds the school librarian (shout-out for great school librarians everywhere!) who was kind to her when she needed kindness most, and she learns that it's possible to visit every possible version of her life. What follows is touching and gently funny, as Nora improvises her way through some of the many different versions of her. Needless to say, she learns plenty about herself along the way, enabling her to re-evaluate who she is, and why, and who she wants to be.

This was the perfect Covid read - a pleasant central character, just taxing enough to take your mind off the madness we're living through, and with the prospect of a happy ending..

In the classic style of Matt Haig, The Midnight Library takes an interesting concept, combines it with a commentary on mental health, and creates a riveting read about humankind. This book has sadness and regret within it, but it is also filled with hope – reflective of much of life for many of us. I loved the concept of seeing how Nora’s life might have turned out based on the different decisions she has made, and it really made me think about what changes I could make in my own life – and if I would have done so or if that might have changed something else that I am so grateful for. Another poignant read by Matt Haig – recommended for anyone is feeling a bit lost (particularly given the current lockdown situation), particularly if they have enjoyed Haig’s previous books.

Sometimes it seems fortuitous that you pick up a book at the exact moment it can really help you. I was having a bad Corona day (you know the ones, where you feel like the black fog of this nightmare will never end and you’ll be trapped in a dystopian world forever…) so I was desperate for a few hours of escapism. I started The Midnight Library and honestly had a huge personal paradigm shift while reading.

Matt Haig has been very open about his mental health, in interviews and on his social media platforms he has revealed that he has attempted suicide in the past. He has written two non-fiction books about mental health – Reasons to Stay Alive and Notes on a Nervous Planet and a brilliant children’s book, The Truth Pixie that also talks about mental health in a way children can understand. In The Midnight Library, he explores this highly personal theme in novel form.

We meet lead character Nora Seed at a pivotal moment in her life; a series of events climax in her taking an overdose. She just does not see the point in living anymore. This is when she finds herself in The Midnight Library, with librarian Mrs Elm:

‘Between life and death there is a library,’ she said. ‘And within that library, the shelves go on for ever. Every book provides a chance to try another life you could have lived.'

Mrs Elm gives Nora The Book of Regrets where all of Nora’s are listed. Nora then gets the opportunity to live a different version of her life and amend a decision she regretted making. If she loves the life enough, she can stay there.

In her ‘root life’ (as her main one is referred to), Nora studied philosophy, taught piano lessons, worked in a music shop and nearly had careers as a both a rock star and an Olympic swimmer. Nearly being the key word here – how much can change when we just make one tiny decision differently?

Elements from Nora’s many lives are cleverly interwoven throughout and although we go with her through several lives, with the same people cropping up, it all feels fresh and new. She has to learn who she is in each life and assess how the decisions she makes in each will have an impact.

As much as there is the pure imagination of Nora’s many lives, Matt Haig ties it in with a deliciously intriguing multi-world string theory physics idea (fear not, non-physics fans, my main knowledge of the topic comes from Sheldon in The Big Bang Theory, so you don’t need to know about it – Matt Haig explains perfectly).

Any book that can combine a wonderful, engaging story with concepts that help you positively shift the way you are thinking about things while also making your heart swell is a truly special find indeed. Such a beautiful, thought-provoking and hopeful book – read it!

“She learned that undoing regrets was really a way of making wishes come true.”
•
Everyone has thought at least once in their lives: “what if...” What if I had picked that job? What if I had gone to another university? What if I had married my first love? Life is made up by choices, and every choice we make, even the smallest, lead us to where we are now. And Nora is in a terrible state. She is depressed and she has many regrets. She could have been an Olympic, a singer, a traveller.. instead she had made all the wrong choices and she has decided it’s not worth living anymore. So she decides to die, but instead of going into Paradise or Hell she ends up in a huge library (which is actually my idea of Paradise 😂). Every book here teels the story of a life she hadn’t lived, a life that would have been if she had taken a different path and she is given the opportunity to experience them and actually see how they are. This book is so inspiring even if a bit predictable, it teaches us an important lesson: it’s meaningless to regret things we haven’t done.. every life is full of loss, pain and regrets, that’s just how life works. What we can do is to try to take the best from the choices we make, to look for the future and to spread love and positivity and never underestimate the importance of the small acts of kindness. Thanks to netgalley for the ARC.

"Because, Nora, sometimes the only way to learn is to live."

Caveat: I received this book free from the publisher, courtesy of NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.

This is my second Matt Haig book after The Humans which I remember enjoying as a mixture of science fiction and The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime but I don’t remember many details of it. An alien taking on the form of a human, learning that humanity is messy and contradictory but ultimately worth protecting. It is rather vague. And my review, looking back on it seems a little briefer than usual too.

This book certainly has similar vibes: it takes a classic sci-fi staple – in this case the quantum idea of the multiverse which should be familiar enough to the general public and viewers of Star Trek and Marvel and DC films and Doctor Who, or to readers of Life After Life (sublime) or The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August (great fun) – and marries it to that same core belief in the value of being alive and being human. It is a very life affirming novel which in these dark days is very very welcome!

Our protagonist is Nora Seed, erstwhile philosophy student, erstwhile singer / song writer, erstwhile swimmer. When we meet her, she is currently unhappily employed in the aptly named String Theory, a struggling music shop; she is estranged from her brother; she is bereft of a love life. But she does own a cat. It is her being sacked and discovering her cat’s death which leads to her deciding to take her own life – a fact which cannot be a spoiler as the opening line of the novel is “Nineteen years before she decided to die…”

Having taken an overdose – and the mechanics and effects of suicide are not elaborated on or glorified – Nora finds herself in a midnight that never ends, at a building which resolves itself into an infinitely large library whose books contain ever possible alternative life Nora could have had, had she made different decisions in her life. Had she not given up swimming, a book contained that life; had she not abandoned her dreams of working as a glaciologist or her philosophy studies or her chance to go for a coffee with a guy, there are books containing those lives. Under the kindly case of someone who looks like Mrs Elm, her old school librarian, Nora gets the chance to dip into and live those alternative versions of herself, and the chance to remain in one that makes her happy.

Between life and death there is a library, and within that library, the shelves go on forever. Every book provides a chance to try another life you could have lived. To see how things would be if you had made other choices… Would you have done anything different, if you had the chance to undo your regrets?


The library offers Nora the chance to be Scott Bakula in her own, personal version of Quantum Leap!

Oh boy!

It is the most fantastic idea and concept! And presenting it as a library rather than, say, a video store is always going to bring a bookish nerdish joy!

Structurally, we do become a little problematic as a novel at about this point, however. The concept requires Nora to try out different lives, to explore different choices she could have made and it does become a little episodic and repetitive as a novel.

The first alternative version of herself is one where she did not split up with her fiance but supported him in realising his dream of owning a country pub. As she steps into this life – and every subsequent life – we follow her almost like a detective trying to uncover the facts she needs to be able to successfully masquerade as the ‘real’ Nora in this version of herself; we see her discover that some of the decisions she regretted in her “root life” may have actually been the right decision after all; she returns to the library re-evaluating that “root life”.

Wash – rinse – repeat.

There was some variation: many of the events in our lives are nothing to do with the decision we may or not make, after all, even if we feel responsible, but that is the core pattern.

Haig manages it well: just as it begins to feel a little repetitive he shifts things a little. He never comes close to the poetry and pathos of the Kate Atkinson, nor the thriller elements of the Claire North book, but he is doing something else wonderful: that simple reminder that life, for all its cares and worries and regrets – perhaps because of all its cares and worries and regrets – is valuable and worth living and grasping onto.

And, at the end of the day, I did come to care for Nora and loved watching her gradual development as a character which could not have happened credibly any more quickly than Haig gave us. She may be one of the quieter characters in my reading recently – but there is room in this world for those quieter characters! – but she and the novel are touching and tender.

And that is a wonderful and timely thing to be reminded of. Perhaps, once we strip away the science fiction and literary clothing, the book that this most brings to mind is Charles Mackesy’s The Boy, The Mole, The Fox and The Horse.

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An exquisitely written look at regrets. I’ve never read one of Haig’s books before but I will definitely be buying the back catalogue. Pure poetry.

Nora Seed has arrived at a dark place whee the pain is so much and she feels so isolated that she doesn't want to carry on living.

She is transported to the Midnight Library where she meets Mrs. Elm the librarian who supported her at school once. The library consists of books, all green in colour and exists between life and death. Firstly Nora has to look at the huge tome of the Book of Regrets. In it are all the times where she regretted a particular decision at a turning point in her life or other small different possible turns.

Nora is allowed the opportunity to become a "slider", to go and try out the lives she might have had. She starts with the bigger decisions like what would have happened if she has continued with a particular relationship /a particular career path etc. If she is content enough she will stay in the other life, if not she will return to the library, but time in her "root life" is running out. Will she be able to choose a life before her time ebbs in her "real" life?

Like Haig's "How to Stop Time" this is a book about how to find meaning in life. Like that book it is underpinned by philosophy. In this case it is quantum physics and string theory. From my very limited understanding of these things there is the theory that there are whole parallel universes where other events have happened.

There is comedy in that Nora arrives in other lives and has to live them with little information. Her phone gives her some details but the reality of being an expert in an area of science , getting into bed with someone who is effectively a stranger can be funny.

Of course Mrs Elm gives hints about the importance of small things for example, but as with life Nora must find her own meaning.
I preferred this to How to Stop Time as the lives are more ordinary (no meetings with Shakespeare). However It doesn't have the tone I so enjoyed in his Christmas trilogy for children.

It is one to get you thinking. I was thinking about major turning points in my own life when I may have chosen differently and I would have had a totally different life. What did I decide ? That would be a spoiler so I won't say.

Reading a new Matt Haig book is like coming home. This was gorgeous – beautiful, haunting, uplifting, bittersweet. It offers a whole new way of looking at the idea of regrets and 'what if's. I really loved it.