It is easy to mourn the live we aren’t living. Easy to wish we’d developed other talents, said yes to different offers. Easy to wish we’d worked harder, loved better, handled our finances more astutely, been more popular […].
But it is not the lives we regret not living that are the real problem. It is the regret itself. It’s the regret that makes us shrivel and wither and feel like our own and other people’s worst enemy. We can’t tell if any of those other versions would have been better or worse. Those lives are happening, it is true, but you are happening as well, and that is the happening we have to focus on.
Before we start: This review contains spoilers.
Matt Haig’s The Midnight Library has been around for quite some time and much has been written about it. Most of us know the basics: Nora Seed is depressed, lonely, and lost pretty much everything. Fed up with losing out, she decides to end it once and for all. But instead of dying, she finds herself in the Midnight Library where she can choose another, better life from an abundance of alternative Noras.
Loosely based on the multiverse theory (and I say ‘loosely based’ because I only have a rudimentary knowledge of this theory and can therefore not determine how much of an expert Haig is), we accompany Nora through various lives (parallel existences?) she chooses based on dreams she gave up, aspirations that withered, and paths that didn’t open up as expected. Chance is she will find her future in one of these alternative universes/existences — or is it not?
Help yourself… a bit too much?
Olympic swimmer, famous bandleader, successful scientist… which life, which path, which fate is the best for Nora? To those who have already read their fair share of self-help books concerning mental health issues and/or have read some of Matt Haig’s other books, the end may not come as a surprise at all. Because there is only one appropriate decision, only one fate that is the reasonable and healthy one to choose from (especially for the audience). I too wasn’t surprised, which is not Matt Haig’s fault.
As some may know, I’ve been dealing with mental health issues for over 15 years; one gets used to a certain kind of messaging. That there is always a path worth exploring, your life is worth so much, and the like. Which does not mean it’s not important and uplifting even now. It’s just more familiar than it was ten years ago. And sometimes it’s very ‘in ya face’ — as it is in this book. Which is nothing bad in itself — just a tad late concerning my personal mental health journey.
The Midnight Library is the third Matt Haig novel I’ve read so far. I also read his non-fiction books and frankly, I prefer his non-fiction work over his novels. I can relate to a lot of the issues he describes in Notes from a nervous planet and Reasons to stay alive and I found the messages in these books much more important for me personally than anything he relays in his fictional works.
Fun to read
Matt Haig is a seasoned author whose books will always be entertaining, intriguing, and ‘fun’ to read. That’s why it’s great that someone with his ability and reach tackles serious topics like mental health issues. But especially The Midnight Library is too much ‘in your self-help face’ for me to cherish the messages. Take, for example, the improvised (sort of) TED Talk Nora gives in her life as an Olympic swimmer:
“[…] what we consider to be the most successful route for us to take, actually isn’t. Because too often our view of success is about some external bullshit idea of achievement – an Olympic medal, the ideal husband, a good salary. And we have all these metrics that we try and reach. When really success isn’t something you measure and life isn’t a race you can win. […]”
I couldn’t help but get the feeling that I’ve read similar messages in various mental health books and on mental health blogs/IGs/tumblrs over the course of the last 15 years. It’s a brilliant speech. I hope it’s helpful for a lot of people, and there’s some solid and great advice in it. But for me, it’s simply too much in my face, too much of what I’ve already read in non-fiction sources for years. This, again, is not Matt Haig’s fault and should in no way discredit the author and his (important) work. I have been on this path of mine for quite some time now, so it’s only natural that I’ve already encountered some of the ideas he uses in this book.
In the end, I guess I’ll stick to Haig’s non-fiction work in the future. I have no issue with a good self-help book that teaches me additional techniques to counter my demons. I just don’t like this in the form of a novel.