The Midnight Library by Matt Haig: For Lives with “I Wish”!

Have you ever said “I wish” in your life? “I wish I had accepted that job offer…”, “I wish I hadn’t ended that relationship…”, “I wish I had continued living in that city…” We all have dreams of the paths we didn’t choose, the lives we didn’t live in a corner of our minds. What if I told you there was a place where you could try out all these “I wish”s? Matt Haig’s novel “The Midnight Library”, which has taken the world by storm, is based on exactly this magical idea.

The main character of the book, Nora Seed, is a woman who is unhappy with her life and deeply regrets the choices she made in the past. Nora finds herself in a mysterious library at a moment when she is thinking of ending her life. This library is filled with an infinite number of books, each of which represents a choice she didn’t make, a different life she could have lived. Nora has the chance to experience these alternative lives by opening the books one by one.

Matt Haig uses this fictional universe to address the question of “Was another life possible?” that we all carry within us with literary depth. The author’s simple yet effective language easily includes the reader in the character’s emotional journey, while also making them realize the value of life and the meaning of every moment. The Midnight Library novel boldly deals with themes such as depression, anxiety, and existential emptiness, and does so with a language full of hope rather than pessimism. In this respect, we feel the of The Last Day of a Condemned Man.

Subject of Midnight Library: Between Life and Death!

Our story begins with Nora Seed, a woman at the lowest point of her life. In her mid-thirties, Nora sees herself as a complete failure. She has lost her job, her cat has died, she has fallen out with her family and friends, and she has abandoned all her talents (swimming, music). She is so convinced that she has disappointed everyone in her life and that her existence is meaningless that one night she decides to end her life.

However, Nora finds herself neither in heaven nor hell. Instead, she opens her eyes in a seemingly endless library, whose walls are filled with countless books from floor to ceiling. When she looks at the clock, she realizes that time has frozen at exactly midnight, 00:00:00. This is that magical place in limbo where there is neither life nor death: the Midnight Library.

In the library, she is greeted by Miss Elm, the school librarian she has known since childhood and who has always been kind to her. Miss Elm tells Nora the rules of this extraordinary place. Each book in this library represents a potential life Nora could have lived if she had made a different choice. Each book is a door to an alternate universe Nora could have lived in.

The Book of Regrets and “I Wish!”

Miss Elm shows Nora how the library works. Nora has the chance to go back to any moment she regrets and experience what her life would have been like if she had made a different decision at that moment. When she says, “I wish I hadn’t left that band,” she can open the book of her life as a rock star. When she says, “I wish I hadn’t left my fiancé,” she can try out the life as a married woman. The choice is entirely hers.

Nora also has a heavy, thick book in front of her: “The Book of Regrets.” This book is a list of all the “if onlys” Nora has collected throughout her life. Her task is simple: choose a regret from this book, take the book of life that corresponds to that regret off the shelf, open it, and enter that life to see if the happiness she is looking for is there. If she is truly satisfied with the life she has tried, she will be able to live there forever.

Book of Regrets to New Lives: Nora Seed’s Path (Summary)

Nora’s extraordinary journey begins with the hope of “repairing” her biggest regrets. First, she tries out a life where she is married to her ex-fiancé. She finds herself as a married woman who runs a bar in the English countryside. However, she soon realizes that the happy marriage she dreams of actually contains stress, lovelessness and completely different disappointments. This life does not bring her happiness and she finds herself in the library again.

Then, she chooses a life where she realizes her dream of becoming a successful swimmer. Suddenly, she finds herself as a famous and disciplined athlete who has won medals in the Olympics. However, this life also has its costs: the pressure from her father, the loneliness brought on by endless training and the heavy burden of expectations on her shoulders… Nora learns the hard way that success does not always mean happiness.

Nora’s journey continues with her trying out dozens of different lives. In one, she is a glaciologist who researches the poles, in another, a happy animal keeper living in Australia, and in another, a famous rock star. Each life shows her a different talent, a different character trait. Some lives are exciting, some are calm and ordinary. Each experience slowly changes Nora’s perspective on herself and life.

The Midnight Library and Its Collapse

During this journey, Nora discovers an important truth: No life is perfect. Even the brightest lives have their dark sides, pains, and difficulties. Likewise, even the most ordinary lives can contain unexpected moments of beauty and happiness. Nora begins to understand that happiness is not a specific “result” but rather a “process.”

But time is running out. While Nora’s body in the real world struggles to survive, the Midnight Library slowly begins to collapse. Shelves shake, books topple over. Nora must find a life truly “worth living” before the library is destroyed, or choose to return to her own life. This becomes a life-or-death struggle that adds excitement and urgency to her quest.

Not Just a Fantasy Novel: On Choices and Happiness

“The Midnight Library” is a philosophical work that gives the reader very deep and healing messages about life, beneath its magical concept. What makes the book so impressive is that while it tells a fantastic story, it actually touches on real emotions that we all encounter in our own lives. The most basic theme of the novel is the tyranny of regret.

Matt Haig very effectively shows how “if only”s and being stuck in the past prevent us from living the present moment. As Nora tries out different lives, she realizes that the alternatives to the choices she regrets are not the perfect paradises she thought they were. This holds up a mirror that makes the reader question their own regrets. Perhaps our greatest source of unhappiness is not the life we ​​live, but those idealized lives we think we cannot live.

Another powerful message of the Midnight Library novel is that each of us has countless potentials. In each new life, Nora discovers a talent she did not know she had (playing the piano, knowing philosophy, being brave). This tells us that we are not just our current profession, identity, or situation. There is always the potential within us to be a scientist, an artist, a traveler, a parent. This is an incredibly hopeful and empowering idea.

On the Midnight Library and Second Chances!

The book emphasizes that happiness is often hidden in small and ordinary moments, not in grand and glorious achievements. Nora experiences her greatest satisfaction not when she becomes a rock star, but when she says a kind word to someone or shares a loving moment with a small dog.

And most importantly, “The Midnight Library” is a novel about hope and second chances. It is the story of a character at the darkest point of his life rediscovering his own value and desire to live. At the end of the novel, we understand that the best life is not one of the infinite alternative lives that could be lived, but the only life we ​​have right now.

“The Midnight Library” is like a book of consolation written for modern times, whispering to us that we should get rid of the burden of a past full of regrets and appreciate the moment. Nora Seed’s journey through that magical library is actually a journey we all make in our own minds every day.

Matt Haig makes us ask that magical question: “If you had an infinite number of tries to find a life worth living, which life would you choose in the end?” The answer given at the end of the book is both surprising and extremely simple: The best life is the one you are in. All you have to do is decide to live that life.

If you also feel lost in the labyrinth of “if onlys” from time to time, this book can be a compass for you. Because maybe the best life is the one where we close the “Book of Regrets” and start turning the pages of that one and precious book of life with enthusiasm and curiosity.