The Midnight Library

In a social media post, Nora asks if anyone ever wonders how they ended up in their current life. She likens life to a maze. She can hear all the successful, happy people who’ve made it outside the maze but cannot find a way out herself. She ends by revealing that her cat has died.

Nora returns to a different part of the Midnight Library. She can now see what looks like an office, though Mrs. Elm sits directly in front of her playing chess. Nora admits that her ideal life with Dan wasn’t what she thought it would be, to which Mrs. Elm replies that it’s difficult “to predict […] The things that will make us happy” (61). When Nora worries about the version of herself she just left behind with Dan, Mrs. Elm explains that the versions of herself she lives won’t recall anything different; many will just find themselves in a different room and forget why they went in there, as everyone does.

Despite trying on a new life, Nora admits to Mrs. Elm that she still wishes to die. Mrs. Elm explains the difference between want and lack. There are times when want stems from lacking something, so Nora might not want to die if she successfully fills the lack with something. Nora still feels any life would be meaningless because she exists in all of them, but she changes her tune when Mrs. Elm suggests she look at The Book of Regrets again to pinpoint what she wants to try. Mrs. Elm casually asks Nora about her cat, Voltaire, and though Nora feels Mrs. Elm is playing a game with her like the chess game she’s currently playing, Nora takes the bait. She asks to visit the life in which she is a good cat owner to Voltaire and in which she doesn’t want to die.

Nora wakes up in her bed, back in Bedford, and immediately calls out for Voltaire. She can’t find him anywhere but then finally sees him under the bed. She calls him by his nickname, Voltsy, but when she reaches for him, she realizes that Voltaire is lifeless. The shock and confusion send Nora right back to the Midnight Library. Nora confronts Mrs. Elm, who now sits in a comfortable chair reading a book. Mrs. Elm reminds Nora that she did not ask for a life in which Voltaire was alive but a life in which she was a good cat owner and Voltaire was inside the house. Nora could not have visited a life in which Voltaire was alive again because, it turns out, Voltaire suffered from a heart disease that killed him. In Nora’s root life, a car didn’t hit Voltaire; he went outside because he knew he was about to die and, like many animals, he wanted to be alone in death.

Mrs. Elm continues to explain to a shocked Nora that, in her root life, she was indeed a great cat owner. Voltaire’s life with Nora was one of his best lives, and he loved Nora. Though Nora still has trouble accepting all the new information, Mrs. Elm instructs her to return to The Book of Regrets and look specifically at the regret about Voltaire. When Nora does, she watches the regret disappear. This exercise allows Nora to stop seeing herself as a bad cat owner, and Mrs. Elm affirms that, because of this change in perception, Nora herself has changed. When Nora again asks why she must endure potentially traumatic experiences, Mrs. Elm says that “sometimes the only way to learn is to live” (67). Nora pushes back against this statement, so Mrs. Elm calls her bluff by agreeing to do nothing. Nora soon gets bored, and after another reminder that she can defy time with infinite possibilities, she chooses the life in which she went with Izzy to Australia. Mrs. Elm mentions that Nora is getting better at choosing lives that will matter to her, but she doesn’t expound on what she means. She then hands Nora the book, and after reading the first sentence, Nora disappears into that life.

Nora begins in the new life by gasping for air in a saltwater pool by the beach. Excited, she looks around for Izzy but cannot find her. There are several swimmers in the pool who greet her warmly, leading Nora to believe that swimming in this pool is her morning routine. She also notes the colorful Casio watch she’s wearing and hopes that it’s an indication of her personality in this life. Nora tries to appear like the version of herself known to these regulars, all while deducing what she can from her surroundings. Though she seems to be in a bay, it doesn’t look like Byron Bay as she’s seen from pictures (and where she and Izzy were supposed to move). She confirms her suspicion when she gets out of the pool and sees that she’s in Bronte Beach, in Sydney. Nora deduces that either she isn’t with Izzy or Izzy isn’t in Byron Bay.

Upon leaving the pool, Nora has no clue where she lives. She runs into someone she’s supposed to know, and the man jokes about her smoking something because she seems so out of it. He reminds her that they’ll see each other later at work. Nora sits and scans her phone for answers. She notices that she posts poetry, and she reads a poem entitled “Fire” that troubles her; the poem mentions “[…] the pain of friends / Already dead” (76), and its contents lead Nora to pull up a message she wrote to a friend in which she vaguely, distantly mentions that she’s happy about her new apartment. The message contains an address—her address. Nora rushes to the apartment, worried at both the distant tone of the message and the poem.

After finding the apartment, Nora enters and marvels at the rundown, student-style interior. A woman plays a video game while smoking from a vape pen; Nora assumes this must be her roommate. Nora sees a National Geographic on the bathroom floor, and the magazine reminds her of when she wanted to be a glaciologist, a career choice she gave up for philosophy and rock stardom when her father died.

Nora engages her roommate, Jojo. Jojo explains that billionaires are infecting cats with toxoplasmosis to make people dumber and that parasitic worms are causing grasshoppers to commit suicide. Jojo mentions all this because Nora wanted to try cat-sitting for money. Nora changes the subject by asking about Izzy, which instantly makes Jojo uncomfortable. Nora soon learns that Izzy died in a car crash while driving to visit Nora for her birthday. The shock once again causes Nora to fade away.

Nora returns to the library to find Mrs. Elm again playing chess. When Nora critiques the life she just experienced, Mrs. Elm reminds her that good choices don’t always equate to good outcomes. In the last life, Nora became depressed after Izzy’s death and stayed in Sydney. Nora remembers a study she once read about zebrafish. Scientist drew a horizontal line on a fish tank, and depressed fish remained below the line. When scientists gave the fish Prozac, the fish swam above the line. Though she likens Australia to a fish tank in the life she just left, Nora also notes that she’s on anti-depressants in every life (so she should theoretically be above the horizontal line on the fish tank).

Mrs. Elm prompts Nora to choose another life, and though Nora still feels the entire exercise is futile, she remembers how happy she felt in the pool in Australia and how happy she initially felt swimming competitively in her root life. She recalls how people nicknamed her The Fish and how she stopped swimming due to the pressure. She felt bad for quitting because this decision permanently altered her relationship with her father. Once she said no to her father’s dream, Nora imagined herself a “walking wound” in her father’s life. Nora then asks to live the life in which she never wounded her father or gave up swimming. Mrs. Elm comments, while playing chess, that straightforward approaches are not always what they seem. Nora takes this to be a comment on her choice, but Mrs. Elm obliges by finding the book Nora wants to experience.

Nora posts on social media that she misses her cat and that she’s tired.

Nora wakes up, this time in London, and finds that she is in the best shape of her life. She’s also immensely successful and is due to give a speech entitled “Inspiring Success” that day. After exercising without getting tired, Nora looks up Izzy, Dan, and herself online. Izzy is alive and happy in Australia, and Dan, married to a spin-class instructor, is also happy. Nora’s own Wikipedia page explains that she went to the Olympics twice and won gold and silver medals. She also earned world records, and she retired from competition at 28. She now works for the BBC and has written memoirs on success. After reading and watching some of her talks about life and success, Nora likens herself to “a self-help Joan of Arc” and marvels at her confidence in this life (93).

While looking for the pool, Nora receives a call from someone named Nadia and learns that her father is still alive in this life. The revelation shocks Nora. Nadia passes the phone to Nora’s father, and though Nora should attempt to fit in, both Nadia and her father notes that she’s acting different. Nora then learns that her father had an affair with Nadia and divorced her mother. Nora also learns that something terrible happened to her in Portugal and she is seeing a therapist. After assuring her father that she’s fine, Nora hangs up and finds a pool in which to swim. Nora considers this new life: Her mother died alone, while her father is happy. Nora herself is alone and lives in London. She now feels anger toward what she perceives as her father’s selfishness in this life.

Nora follows the itinerary left for her and goes to the lobby for her talk preparation. There, she sees her brother Joe, who is both happy and well-dressed. Nora feels overwhelmed because, in this life, she seems to have a good relationship with Joe. Like her father and Nadia, however, both Joe and the woman assisting with the talk preparations, Rory, notice that Nora is somehow different.

Nora and Joe sit together while waiting for the event to begin. By this point, Nora knows that Joe has been her manager for the last seven years. She still marvels at how professional he is in this life. He hands her peppermint tea though she secretly craves the coffee he’s drinking. Joe again asks Nora if she’s feeling alright and then reminds her that the 40-minute talk is a lot of money. Nora tries asking if Joe ever wonders how life might be different, but Joe says he doesn’t think about such things. He imagines he’d still be at school in Manchester, a revelation that also shocks Nora (Joe never went to university or cared for school in Nora’s root life). Nora also learns that Joe has been married to a man named Ewan for five years and is genuinely happy. In Nora’s root life, Joe never had much luck with men. At one point Nora quotes Thoreau, shocking Joe, and she remembers that, in this life, she gave up everything—including her love of philosophy—to become a great swimmer.

Joe mentions a documentary he recently saw about Greenland, which prompts discussion about Nora’s former obsession with glaciers. They talk about Svalbard, the Norwegian archipelago on which she once wanted to work with glaciers. Joe also informs Nora that he ran into Ravi, whom he believes still pines for the days when they played in a band. Ravi is living a lackluster life now, and Joe invited him to Nora’s talk. When Nora switches the subject and asks where she was when their mom died, Joe again becomes concerned about her. He reminds Nora that she didn’t have time to be with their mom because of her schedule, and their mom died from drinking due to the Nadia affair. Nora feels bad about not being there for their mother, and her sadness shocks Joe further because, in this life, Nora was never close to their mother.

A woman informs Joe and Nora that it’s her time to speak. Both Joe and Rory assess Nora with worried looks on their faces, and though Nora tells Joe that she’s having a panic attack and can’t speak, he chides her by reminding her they’re receiving a lot of money for the talk.

Although Nora begins shakily, she launches into a talk about the tree of life. She mentions how the tree develops branches and how every branch is like a choice in a life, all of them tied to the main root. Nora recalls all the information she has learned from Mrs. Elm in the Midnight Library and sprinkles it into her talk as. Despite getting the crowd’s attention, Nora goes off-script by admitting of life: “It’s all…bollocks, actually…” (112). She tells the crowd that she has life fright and that a rotten life will always be rotten regardless of any new choice. As Joe motions for her to stop talking and the crowd stares at her in shock, Nora slips away from the successful life and returns to the Midnight Library.

Upon returning to the Midnight Library, Nora sees the lights flickering and Mrs. Elm in a panic—both indications of a system error. Moreover, Mrs. Elm can’t hear Nora. It’s not until Nora touches Mrs. Elm that Mrs. Elm realizes Nora returned from the life she’d been experiencing. Mrs. Elm mentions that there was an error with Nora’s transfer, a possible indication that, in Nora’s root life, she’s closer to death. When Nora thinks about swimming in a pool, however, she enacts a “physical shift. A change in her” (115). Nora’s fond memory of swimming causes her to feel conflicted about wanting to die. This shift causes the lights to stop flickering and therefore fixes the system error.

Nora now wants to experience a life in which her mother is alive, but Mrs. Elm reminds her that the books all contain her life, not the lives of others. Mrs. Elm then prompts Nora about glaciology. Nora decides next to try a life in which she pursued studying glaciers in the Arctic Circle.