The Midnight Library

The chapter opens 19 years later, and 27 hours before Nora decides to die. Someone rings Nora’s door and, upon answering, she sees Ash, a doctor who once asked her out for coffee. Nora wonders if he might ask her out again and warms to the possibility. She finds his presence awkward, however, and when she tries engaging him, he finally informs her that a car has hit her cat, Voltaire. Nora rushes outside to Voltaire’s lifeless body. Though saddened, Nora envies the cat’s fate.

Nora works at a music store called String Theory. She arrives to work late, nine-and-a-half hours before she decides to die. Though mourning Voltaire, and although she tells her boss, Neil, about Voltaire’s abrupt death in the hope that he’ll take pity on her, Neil begins questioning Nora’s life choices instead. He queries why she stopped swimming at 14 despite being the fastest breaststroke swimmer in the country and second fastest at freestyle. She also earned a philosophy degree from a London university but returned to Bedford. Moreover, Nora started a band, The Labyrinths, with her brother, Joe, and their friend Ravi. They could have become a hit, but Nora left the band to marry Dan—an engagement she then canceled two days before the wedding. When Neil mentions that Joe came to town recently, Nora feels hurt that her brother didn’t even bother to visit her. Neil then fires Nora so that she can do something better with her life.

Jobless and aimless, Nora walks around Bedford. She thinks about Dan, who sends her drunken texts proclaiming his love for her. The narrator continues winding down the clock: It’s now only nine hours before Nora will attempt suicide. As it begins raining, Nora takes shelter at a magazine store while wondering if things will get worse. The narrator affirms that things are in fact about to get much worse for Nora.

While taking shelter in the magazine store, Nora runs into Ravi, her brother’s best friend and her former bandmate. She queries Ravi about Joe’s visit, but Ravi doesn’t offer up much information. He’s angry and hostile and admits that he and Joe are still upset because Nora walked away from The Labyrinths when the band had the opportunity to sign a recording contract. Now, Joe suffers from depression and can’t keep an apartment, while Ravi cleans toilets while looking for subpar music gigs in pubs. Nora and Ravi quarrel about the past, and when Nora tries defending herself by saying that she left the band to marry Dan, Ravi calls her bluff by saying, “I don’t think your problem was stage fright. Or wedding fright. I think your problem was life fright” (15). Nora takes this assessment of her failures to heart, and Ravi storms out the shop.

The store worker, Kerry-Anne, recalls Nora from school and asks what she has done with her life. Nora was the one student they all thought would leave Bedford. Nora mentions she returned because her mom was sick but then rushes from the store while wishing she could just keep running through doors.

Nora texts her friend Izzy, desperate for connection. It’s now seven hours before she will decide to die. She considers the words of her favorite philosopher, Henry David Thoreau, about confidently pursuing one’s dreams, but she suspects that life in Thoreau’s time was far simpler than her life in Bedford. Nora thinks that nothing ever happens in her life.

Nora’s phone rings. She hopes it’s either Izzy or her brother; instead, it’s the mother of her music pupil, Leo. Nora’s forgotten his lesson, and both Leo and Doreen waited for Nora but then left. Moreover, Doreen cancels Leo’s lessons permanently because he isn’t interested in piano any longer. An hour later—four hours before Nora contemplates suicide—the old man she brings a prescription to informs her that he no longer needs her help; Nora rushes home, overwhelmed with a feeling of uselessness: “No one needed her. She was superfluous to the universe” (20). Her apartment still smells like Voltaire, adding insult to injury. Nora pours herself wine and goes online, only to see how well everyone else’s lives look. After taking stock of her failures, Nora feels that she isn’t meant to live. Not even her depression pills help her cope with her life. Nora downs all her wine, posts updates on social media, and writes a suicide note.

Nora stands on a mist-covered pathway. When the mist clears, she notices a large building and a clock that shows it is midnight. Nora walks inside the building and notices it is limitless; there are countless bookshelves lined with books of different sizes, all different shades of green. She looks for an exit but is unable to find one. When Nora pulls a book off a shelf, a voice behind her warns her to be careful.

When Nora turns toward the voice, she sees a prim and proper librarian. On further inspection, she realizes the librarian is Mrs. Elm, her old high school librarian. Nora flashes back to the day in the library, 19 years prior, when Mrs. Elm received the ominous phone call. Mrs. Elm revealed to Nora on that day that Nora’s father had died from a heart attack, and then Mrs. Elm comforted Nora as Nora cried. Now, Nora wonders where exactly she is and asks Mrs. Elm if she is dead.

Mrs. Elm sums up where Nora is by stating first: “Between life and death there is a library” (29). This library contains all the lives that Nora could have lived had she made different choices. Each book allows Nora the chance to try on a different life. Nora thinks she’s dead, but Mrs. Elm reminds her that they are between life and death. Nora informs Mrs. Elm that she wants to die, but Mrs. Elm tells Nora that death chooses whom it takes and not the other way around. Nora feels slighted even by death but then recalls that her entire life has been one of disappointment. She begins thinking of all her regrets. Mrs. Elm informs Nora that the library exists for as long as Nora is alive; because of its precariousness, Nora must decide how she wants to live before it’s too late.

When the shelves begin moving, speeding up and slowing down at intervals, Nora queries Mrs. Elm about what’s happening. Mrs. Elm explains that each book is a life in which Nora made one choice differently and set off a chain reaction of differences: “If you would have just done one thing differently, you would have a different life story. And they all exist in the Midnight Library. They are all as real as this life” (31). To further explain, Mrs. Elm asks Nora what in her life she’d like to have done differently. It’s possible to explore that different life in the Midnight Library. When Nora can’t choose, Mrs. Elm produces a gray book to help her, explaining, “This book is the source of all your problems, and the answer to them too” (33). She then explains that the book is called The Book of Regrets.

Mrs. Elm instructs Nora to open The Book of Regrets. On doing so, Nora notes that her regrets, from as far back as when she was born, appear on the pages. Some are faint, while others are bold. Some disappear at times and then return. Toward the end of the book, Nora sees that most of the regrets center around her treatment of Dan.

Nora thinks about how she first met Dan and how happy he made her. His dream was to open a pub in the countryside, and Nora wanted to help make it happen, but her mother became sick and they placed the dream on hold. Nora’s mother died three months before they were set to be married, and Nora used every excuse to stay in Bedford. She called off the wedding, canceled on her friend Izzy and their plan to move to Australia, and self-sabotaged her life. Nora suddenly feels overwhelmed from all the regret. She drops the book and cries. Mrs. Elm instructs her to quickly shut the book so that the regret doesn’t overwhelm Nora. Though the book is heavy, Nora manages to shut it.

Mrs. Elm presses Nora to choose a life. She encourages Nora to base her choice on a regret she wishes to undo, but Nora still can’t fathom the point in trying. Mrs. Elm then reminds Nora that the Midnight Library exists while Nora is alive in her root life, which means that she will need somewhere to exist once her root life ends. The Midnight Library is every present and future, starting from this moment at midnight. Nora can try these lives and exist in them for an indeterminate amount of time. There are no past lives (although Mrs. Elm has read all of Nora’s possible past lives) in the books—only future possibilities.

When Nora notices the endless ceiling decorated with bulb lights, one of the bulbs flickers. Mrs. Elm issues a warning in response: Once Nora dies in her root life, the Midnight Library disappears. Likewise, if Nora is in this in-between place and allows depression to overcome her, the feeling will affect her root life. Moreover, if Nora feels disappointment in one of the lives she’s trying on, she’ll instantly reappear in the Midnight Library to hopefully try again with another life. Nora must choose a new life and live in it happily before her root life ends.

Nora finally begins considering a regret she wishes to reshape, and she thinks of Dan, their marriage, and his dream of opening a pub together. Mrs. Elm finds this life and hands Nora the book. Nora opens it, and as she reads the first line, the text disappears and she begins a new life.