Book Review: The Midnight Library, Matt Haig

 The Midnight Library, Matt Haig

My rating: 3 /5 stars

Book of 2022: 11

Read: 11/08 - 13/08/2022

Nora’s life has been going from bad to worse. Then at the stroke of midnight on her last day on earth she finds herself transported to a library. There she is given the chance to undo her regrets and try out each of the other lives she might have lived. 

Which raises the ultimate question: with infinite choices, what is the best way to live?

Once again a pretty stagnant blurb of a book that seeks out to tackle a hugely significant topic. But there we are. When I’m selecting a book, I’ll give the blurb a once-over, but then I’ll turn to the first page and decide if the opening, and the writing style are enough to entice me further. 

This book has a large premise. Suicide, feeling unworthy, regrets, failure, family breakdown, death, the lot. It’s one I probably related to more when I was younger, but I did still feel its significance. 

I couldn’t help but feel that at times that I was being spoken down to throughout this novel, that its tone felt overly simplified, that some of the takeaways were ultimately over-obvious. However, I think the goal of this book is to make mental health discussions accessible to all. To paint suicidal thoughts as a very genuine reality for a lot of people. So I’m not mad about that. 

I think the only element that struggles is that it is SUCH A BIG, IMPORTANT TOPIC, and may feel shrunken down. Like perhaps the book tries to do too much in not enough time, space, or intelligence. 

I felt that we didn’t spend enough time with Nora before delving into the library and her decision to end her own life. Though that’s obviously an impactful event, we weren’t given enough time to care about Nora, or sympathise before that point. 

Then we live through Nora’s different lives which was interesting. Nora had a lot of career opportunities which felt a biiiiit insane to me. But again, I feel this was to reinforce the whole point of the novel. I suppose it wouldn’t have been as impactful if we only saw Nora return to only one or two regrets. There were also a lot of people popping in and out of her past lives which made it confusing at times to keep track of. Again - maybe it was doing too much. 

Ultimately, I’m glad she didn’t end up in the final life we saw. I really hoped Matt Haig wasn’t about to say ‘the key to happiness for a woman is a husband and a child’, because WTF. But he didn’t, which was good at least. 

Overall, I did enjoy this, and it didn’t take me very long to read (aided by a long National Express journey back from London). I did understand the messaging, but I found it a little bland, a little predictable. But there’s sort of nothing wrong with that because of the premise of the novel, and Matt Haig’s role in the world, and the message he is trying to spread. 

I think 15 year old me needed this book more than 23 year old me did. 

So I hope it gets to those people who need to read it.