For someone like me who reads for character, Matt Haig’s The Midnight Library is not an easy book. Nora Seed, the main character, is hard to like, in whatever version of life she’s living. And, of course, we all bring our own view of life to a book, so I was never satisfied with Nora’s choices. I liked the idea of the library itself more than I liked Nora.
At thirty-five, Nora Seed is leading a sad life in Bedford, England, and she’s depressed. She teaches piano, works at a music store part-time, and has a cat where she lives in a shabby little apartment. In one day, though, she loses a piano student, is fired, learns her cat died, and her neighbor tells her he doesn’t need her to pick up her prescriptions anymore. Nora doesn’t think she has anything to live for, so she takes too many pills to try to kill herself. She ends up in an in-between place. The Midnight Library is in between life and death. Mrs. Elm, the librarian who runs the library, was Nora’s school librarian when she was in seventh grade. Nora remembers lunch hours in the library fondly. Now, every book in the library offers a chance for Nora to try another life she could have lived.
When Nora first begins to try out other lives, she looks at her Book of Regrets, and tries to correct those with her choices. However, time after time, she’s not satisfied with her life in those choices, and ends up back at the Midnight Library. Eventually, she tries multiple lives, looking for one that will satisfy her. She even meets another traveler, a man who says they’re sliders who slide from one life to another. He’s content with that. Nora is not.
And, that’s my problem with Nora. As I said, I brought my own expectations and feelings to the book. There were a couple times I thought Nora should have been happy, and she wasn’t. One life bothered me because of her reaction. In a life when her father was alive and her brother was working with her, she was upset that her father had lived with a life she didn’t expect. I thought Nora made one major mistake in her choices, but that’s my view. However, it didn’t make it any easier to like her.
I read The Midnight Library for a library discussion. I wouldn’t have picked it up otherwise, and I’m not sure I would have finished it. I was curious as to what Nora’s final decision would be. I have to admit, though, that it’s possible, I wouldn’t have been happy with any of Nora’s choices. I just didn’t like her. We’ll see what others think when I go to the book chat.
Matt Haig’s website is https://www.matthaig.com/
The Midnight Library by Matt Haig. Penguin Books, 2020. 288p.
FTC Full Disclosure – Library book
