After thirty-something Nora Seed kills herself, she arrives as a possibly metaphorical library with an infinite number of books containing her possible lives, each one of which she may try out, always starting on the night of her suicide.

For me, the depiction of Nora’s suicidal ideation and eventual killing of herself were dismissive of those who face depression every day, and the outcome was fictionally romanticized in a way that may induce suicide rather than showing understanding and encouragement to seek out help when life is dark. I don’t see this as intentional by the author.
—Michael Main
“Every life contains many millions of decisions. Some big, some small. But every time one decision is taken over another, the outcomes differ. An irreversible variation occurs, which in turn leads to further variations. These books are portals to all the lives you could be living.”

Tags

(5)

Variants

(2)
  1. The Midnight Library by Matt Haig (Canongate Books, August 2020).
    2. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . written by Matt Haig
  2. audio reading.
    The Midnight Library by Matt Haig (Canongate Books, September 2020).
    3. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . written by Matt Haig
    . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . narrated by Carey Mulligan

Translations

(1)
  1. German.
    Die Mitternachtsbibliothek by Matt Haig (Droemer, February 2021).
    2. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . written by Matt Haig
    . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . translated by Sabine Hübner