The Midnight Library by Matt Haig

Hello. I'm Christina Young. The founder of Gloucester book club. Welcome to our podcasts in. Tonight's episode will be discussing the Midnight Library by Matt Haig.

When Nora seed finds herself in the Midnight Library, she has a chance to make things right up. Until now her life has been full of misery and regret she feels, she has let everyone down including herself but things are about to change. The books in the Midnight Library, enable Nora to live as if she had done things differently, with the help of an old friend, she can now undo every one of her regrets as she tries to work out her perfect life but things aren't always what she imagined they'd be and soon her choices place the library and herself in extreme danger Before Time runs out.

She must answer the ultimate question. What is the best way to live? Tonight on our book club panel, I have with Mead, Zoe Joe and Tony. Let's see what they think about the book. Hi, good evening guys. It's really good to have you here with me on the panel again. This evening, we're going to talk about the Midnight Library by Matt. Hey, let's have a chat about it. And Zoe tell me what you thought about that book. This is actually the first time I've read any of Matt Higgs fiction. I've read a couple of his non-fiction books, research, read notes on a nervous Planet.

So I was really interested to see how a lot of his ideas translate into fiction and Yeah, there were parts of it. I enjoyed there were parts of it that I disliked which I thought was similar to some of my quibbles about his non-fiction writing. I think he's a very, very engaging writer. I think he writes very well about mental health in a way that appeals to a lot of people but some of the things that I've found less enjoyable when you get into the multiverses and the parallel world that Nora goes into, is this just like One chapter where he just lists the sheer number of Worlds that she can go into.

And sometimes I think some of his aphorism, some of his statements about philosophy and life while so really interesting. They're a bit heavy-handed in a fiction book because it's meant to be coming from Nora's point of view. But overall I really enjoyable read and I would recommend it to a lot of people for the scenes of mental health and suicide awareness as well. I think it deals with in a very good and a very sensitive way. It's so, are you saying that you've felt that some of the lives that she went into a little bit far-fetched?

You know you? Oh no, not quite. I enjoyed the far-fetched lives. You know, I enjoyed the scope of it going from a small as being in bedfordshire to as big as being in svalbard or somewhere like that. No what I mean is that at some point towards the middle of the novel, as she's traveling through these lives? I think I got a little bit bored with some of it. And I'm just trying to work out why maybe our discussion will help draw it out for me a little bit. But yeah, I enjoyed the scope of it and I didn't think anything was too Fantastical either.

Tony. Tell us your thoughts. Yeah, this is actually my third nonfiction book by Matt Hague and brother. The one I enjoyed the least of the three, right? I think a subtle distinction while they're a clearly. I think it needs books mental Philosophy at cetera. There's lots of these messages in there. I felt in this book though. It was almost the other way round. It was a almost a self-help book first in the guise of fiction rather than a fiction book. First giving you insight, and feeding your thought processes on mental health issues.

So, in the past, the other two, I would call traditional works of fiction, but you definitely made you think of things living. In for a very long time, etcetera. So I do think some of the other books fiction, first, something in there for you, you know, to broaden your horizons second. This book, I felt was the other way around. It was almost, I felt, he had an idea of a message, you wanted to pass on an important message, but I feel he didn't translate that into a story of the piece of fiction.

Particularly, well, that as a piece of fiction week as a book, Worth reading very worth reading. Yeah. Interesting. When you were saying that Tony the listeners can't see this but we're watching each other on a screen and we were all nodding our heads at that time. When you were talking about that thing, we all agree that it seems to be bridging a gap between self-help and fiction. Maybe, you know, it doesn't quite pull that off. And we're, you know, what do you think Joe? Well, I kind of agree with Tony really.

I was nodding away and I'm still nodding. It was think was a bit on the pop psychology, sir. Side and essentially tell you to his right, it's really a self-help book posing as a novel and I'm not sure that it works really as a novel. As a self-help book, the messages are really important thoroughly, approve of my takes mental health campaigns and his efforts to improve the nation's mental health. The idea is in the book were cleverly. Cleverly got over, and it was very thought-provoking, so don't be too harsh on him know.

Exactly. I'm going to start by saying, but I You like Matt Hagen. I think I agree with you, Tony. You were saying you've read some of his nonfiction and reasons to be alive and so on. And I've read that and I, you know, I thought we were excellent. Really, excellent books. I do struggle a little bit more with his fiction. Don't know why. I just think, you know, this is a good story. Good idea. Think about, you know, I mean, he's obviously trying to get the message over that none of us are ever going to have a completely perfect life.

We're always going to have ups and downs. We're always gonna have bits of Our Lives, which are going to be Better than others, you know, and times when we hit some really bad patches I don't know. I wanted to really like it. It's have a lot of hype. This book, hasn't it is it had a lot of exposure. Lots of people online, and I've read reviews of, really say, it's excellent and they really loved it. I did struggle to love it that much. I'm afraid, but I would thoroughly recommend some of these non-fiction books for anyone.

He wants to double with those and actually He is a very good Ambassador for mental health and in particular, men's mental health, which you know doesn't get talked about enough, really? I think, yeah, I mean, he's done really, really well with. You know, just bringing it up into the Public's attention, one of the questions I want to ask you, you know, she spend Nora spends all the time in this Midnight Library, which for the listeners who don't know. The story is kind of like a limbo land between life and death.

Don't want to give away too many spoilers about how come She's there, but she is if you had to choose a place, which was your Midnight Library, where would it be? And the idea is Tony. Where would you go? Oh, mines, very easy, her record store. Yeah, imagine flicking through the good old-fashioned physical, you know, record store vinyl flicking through the vinyl, looking through things, you want things, you don't know, picking them up look feel so. Yeah, absolutely. A record store. You stole the mine.

I was going to say that but never mind. What about you Zoe where you where you going to be? Well I was reading the Midnight Library sort of in transit this week. I went to go visit my sister in Essex and part way through I had to get the tube and I thought that would be my space because there's something really magical. I love about being in London being on the tube and people watching and sort of imagining all these different loads that you might go into and I'm lucky enough. Enough. I didn't grow up in London, but a lot of my friends moved there.

So I have a lot of memories already at a lot of the different stops and I imagine you could get on and off each stop into a different life. So that was going to be my place would be constantly traveling around on the tube. Yeah. That's it. Okay. Yeah. Where would you be? But it would I be well? My Midnight Library would be a pub I found on the Isle of Wight and build. There's a young man to start my legal training. Quite lonely. And I'm My Own never been there before, and I found this lovely Pub in chaos without the Fantastic landlord who became basically a little bit of a Dutch uncle.

For me, it's sort of angry, uncle and I was very happy going there to tell him my worries and problems and getting advice from him. I would pick my good friends, so it was quite a close Bond. We had very safe there, it's important thing. I think that any of these examples people give is that you have to feel safe. Yeah, sure. Sure. So he would be with you in your in the pub and you'd be sitting on one side of the bar and he'd be on the other and you know, you probably not up with a pint, be giving you his advice, giving me this advice and he was about 20 years older than me, so he had a lifetime's worth of experience.

Yeah, I can picture it. I can picture the scene you've already which was your favorite life that Nora went into? Did you have a favorite? The life that I know, I would want, I wouldn't necessarily say it. Favorite life. But Nora is most comfortable life where she lives with her partner and a child and she's lecturing at Cambridge. I mean wow, what a life but the dog and she's got time for childcare that ticks a lot of boxes to me. Wasn't my favorite life, it's the life. I kind of wish I had and I think she wishes she had to.

I really like the life where I think she works in an in an animal's. With animals and she seems really happy there as well. Yeah. I don't quite remember what she's doing it. Isn't it? Her route life where she works? She worked with animals in on. Why can't she works in the music shop in her route life and yeah that's a term that I think books people who haven't read the book may not be familiar with but there's this whole concept of a root life, isn't that as you're like start a life? Yeah that's the you real life, the life that you live in.

Any particular you know episodes lives that she went into Tony that you you put you were attracted to most definitely the music one but not version of it. I would probably I don't know if I knew this when I was a young kid the I'd because I love music, I don't know, I didn't want to be the sound or light engineer so no, I wouldn't want to be the famous person on the front of the stage possibly with excesses but the Idea of touring, huge crowds Arenas different countries, you know, but being in a technical role in that kind of life, I think appeals see beyond the support role than Tony, not the not the rock chick that Nora turned out to be about the light Engineers.

The person understand no good without them, I'm sure many rock chicks. Would agree with you there. Joe, what would you choose as your favorite life? Well II agree. And these are basically, I think the happy life with a family is kind of irresistible. Really. I mean, it's almost the epitome of what we tend to hope for it to be happily settle down with a nice partner and children and a good life. But I must say there's quite an appeal in the, for me, in the fall. Bard life, the basic geology experience, or what my experience has, she didn't study it in the end, she know.

But I quite like the idea of saving the world and Rainbow Warrior type World solving all the environmental problems with because they've been hunted. Bipolar B is a big part of this. Of this story. And when she goes into the library, there it is. The book of regrets. She's overwhelmed by it. When she first looks in it as she kind of experiences more different lives. I think she starts to come to terms with things a bit better. Do you think that by considering the ways in which Our Lives might have turned out differently that any regrets that you have just go away or do we simply learn to live with them?

No, I think about it actually. I'm surprised that living parallel lives didn't increase the book of regrets, it seemed to be that she was always removing Regrets by doing some things differently. Things that she would have changed but I think in reality, if we were able to access our own midnight, libraries, who's to say that, you know, going down different password, and create more regrets, and we'd become aware of more knowledge of things that we'd missed out of that. We wouldn't be aware of otherwise, that's my only.

Quibble with it. I would say I love this idea of being able to raise all of your regrets, but I just again, found it a tad, too unrealistic for somebody who's in the frame of mind that Nora's in when she enters the Midnight Library, despite all the time that's passed. Yeah, absolutely. I'm just going to read you. A quick quote from this book actually about this subject of regrets. 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.

So he's kind of saying there is you not that actually, it's the feeling of regret, isn't it? That's that's, that's worse. Rather than the bit that we kind of feel, we missed out on. What do you think Tony? That's a big question, just the book of regret itself when we got to that part of the book and it was all too much and she closed it because I do think. And again, the whole self-help mental health side of the book, you know, I would not like to dwell on regret because I could imagine and I'm assuming some people's do spend probably a little bit too much time if I'd done this if I done.

That because I look at that as a very deep dark hole, you know, and I think, you know, her reading the book and closing it and becoming too much for her. So, I just see at the sort of heart of the book. I think this whole idea of regrets, and the thinking about it in of itself is a, yeah, is a big subject both. Yeah, that's so that side of it. And then, you know, the, her individual regrets. I think the to me, one of the major lessons And say is not necessarily the regret, some of them got dessert.

He was saying some of them were removed to just a different flavor of that, some of them got removed because through mrs. Elm through the past life, she learned to see things from a different view. It's the old you look. But you don't see kind of discussion because I think as the book went on, she understood her her call Life, a root life better than she She did, she was looking at her own life incorrectly, but it was only through seeing others and other scenarios that she better understood her own life.

You'd has regrets. That's from her perspective. Look at it from a different perspective it isn't. I think that comes through really strongly Tony, doesn't it? And you seem to be playing as well. That, you know, that there isn't really any point in looking back at things and wishing it were different because it's never going to be so Almost like a waste of energy. It's a waste of time to do that dangerous. Yeah, that's why that is the black hole. You know, you spend too much time looking down there.

That's not a good place to be. No, no. Because I suppose it keeps you there doesn't, it doesn't keep you in the net Here and Now where, you know, you can hopefully enjoy, what's happening on the day that you're in. You're looking backwards or into this black hole. What about you Joe? What do you think? All right, I agree with you. I think that the problem with the story up. Egrets and agonizing over them is that you just focus on the bad stuff and he's clearly what he's trying to say to people is don't focus on what you think of the things you did wrong or should have done.

Don't focus on your regrets as it were, it's like the Heart of Darkness in this book. It's a black hole. Do you think you did? You guys spend a lot of time thinking about things like you could have done or paths you could have gone down and how life might have turned out here? And out differently for you. Yeah, I'm not doing I do that far too much. And I think what's really important is how Matt hey, Linksys, as a symptom of depression, I think like Tony said, it can be a black hole. And unfortunately, for some of us that sometimes in our lives, we can fall into this black hole and so that the thoughts become all-consuming.

And I think I spend a lot of time looking back, despite being one of the younger members of this group. I don't think age has any relation to it. I think it's a lot about mindset and about your state of mind and your perspective and how you look on the world. And this book did help me to think about that for a little bit. Like I said, it's not my favorite book ever, but I like that. It encouraged me to step outside of my present time for the moment and think about a multitude of different lives and different perspectives.

And until there was really good, I think it's clear isn't it? This purple. It doesn't turn out to be any one of your most favorite books, it actually is quite a brings up. Good things for discussions. Definitely, I would agree with that. Yeah, as The Story Goes, On Nora finds herself in lives that she could be more satisfied with than others. Do you think that you'd be able to live as an alternate version of yourself? If you were able to and would you want to do? What would what do you say? Well, that's a very difficult question, isn't it?

Because if you change something about yourself to the delivers, a different Person effectively, what you don't know, what all the other factors are that make you who you are will be lost as well. It is very easy to say, I wish I hadn't done this, I hadn't been that but little bit like the butterfly flapping its wings on the other side of the world causing a typhoon next to you. I like the idea of spending a bit of time in there and then if I didn't like it coming back out again I want to be trapped, you know, that want to be trapped in a life that it Particularly like, but it would be nice, wouldn't it be able to go into a parallel universe and see what you could have been?

If you were doing something else? Would you still be the same person that you are in your root life? You know, would you turn out to be a completely different personality? That's a really interesting one, I think, what about you tell me you've got any got, any desires to go into any other lives? But not, I'm not a dweller. I do think in the past, but I wouldn't say deeply but relating. To the story. One thing I did think would have been a big shift as if when she went into other lives. She had the memories of herself in that life because every life he went in cold, if you like quite literally, not who will did the room or walking out to do a presentation as an Olympic swimmer on stage in a band.

So in of itself, you know, that that would be terrifying, but I did always, and I did Like the message in there and I think the learning through the lives where she appreciated, not a property, it's not hers. He went, as I said she went in as herself 100% And there's a part of me goes. I wonder what this story would have been if she went in as a self but she had access to the memories of the. So she knew who the people were. She knew that song lyrics? You know he could participate more. More actively in that life versus being a stranger to it.

But there was like learning in there and her appreciating this isn't my space not even just the setting. Is it good? Is it bad? You know, this isn't this isn't mine, did you feel? I mean, you know, there's some serious serious question, serious. Mental health issues are brought up in this book and one of which is, you know, where people get to. So desperate that they feel that they want to end their lives. Did you feel that he did? A good job at kind of making. You understand what had brought Nora to those thoughts.

Or did you feel that you didn't have enough information about why she had got become so desperate? I think we had enough circumstantial information. Certainly we didn't know about the history of Nora's mental health prior to. I think about 48 Hours where the novel starts and you know, immediately from the outset That she's feeling suicidal or she's going to be suicidal because it says so many hours before Nora decided to die. So already, as you meet her in the introduction, you're primed with this information that she's starting to feel this way.

And I think for me, there's enough, there's more than enough to be going on in the last sort of day or so of her life to, to really make her feel quite low, you know, she loses her job, her cat dies, Um, and there's a wealth of other relationships that she feels out of touch with and she feels that she's missed and she, I think she really feels the sense of isolation and that people, that once loved her hated her, including her brother, which I would find incredibly hard to deal with I think given the circumstances.

Yeah. What did you think about it? I mean, did you, you know, feel that we had enough kind of information about? I really I think this is a good example of Where it fails as a work of fiction. That's of the self-help messages there, right? And center, but the little little bits of missing of the story of Nora and her back her background, you have to piece them together. Later on when you discover about her, very dominating, father pressing his, the competitive swimming example that that must have been a factor in making her the perfectionist that she became and that brings with it all the problems that become apparent in other way.

I think that's the problem. Basically, with the book that the fiction parts are not fleshed out, enough beside rates amongst young. People are pretty high, aren't they? These days? Particularly amongst young man, as well. I think we talked about this. We have talked about it, I do previous book club. Meetings is a serious issue. We've also discussed the fact that women tend to be people who overdose more often, men tend to be what people Who take a more extreme? Kind of, you know, that there's no coming back from, you know them, then that jump off a high building or they might hang themselves, you know, it really brought home to me, when I was reading this book, how hard it must be for young people.

These days, you know, I was thinking about, to my time, as a young person, which is a very long time ago, I would say, but I'm not sure we have the same pressures as young people have on them. Now what do you think Tony about that? Think on that last point, you know, I've got a daughter in her twenties and, you know, back from uni and the last couple of years now, you know, I, you know, as I said, I've had opportunities to live life and bits and pieces and I do feel more for young people. Particularly that, you know, this especially, I don't know if you haven't got a partner, you know, your friend, you know, people have been living.

I don't know virtually. I suppose, you know, doing this and that no touch. That personal relationships either, you know, the last couple of years has been hard for everybody in many ways, which is why depression and anything to do with, it is a very good subject, including this chat. But, yeah, I feel more for young people over the last couple of years because I think, I, you know, I've got a whole bunch of history and memories and experiences that other people are being denied at this moment. Yeah, absolutely.

So you are the youngest person on the panel, the steepness? Yeah, that's true. I mean so I'm 28 for context and I found some parts of the novel particularly as Nora's feeling so low about herself, one of the last things she does before she decides that she wants to die is to go through her social media and I thought that was a really key line that Matt Hague used. I can't remember exactly. But I remember it, stood out to meet with something like Laura was scroll and say Nora was scrolling through her social media and And everybody else had their lives figured out and she hadn't.

And I'm a young person on the cusp of remembering a time when we didn't have social media, or where we used it in frequently. And now as an adult in my working and professional life. I've worked with teenagers and young people who are also using it. So I can see the difference between the two things. And I think that in my experience, what depression does to you is it robs you of any opportunity. Seeing the future. So I think the older that you do get then the more experiences you do have as Tony was saying the more you can say to yourself, oh, this was like this time when this heartbreak happened and I got through this.

So maybe I can get through this too. When you're a young person you don't always have that context and it doesn't give nor has aged in the book. Does it? She's in her mid 30s? So, she's a little little bit older than I am. But I can see in terms of maturity, she's not had many experiences yet and she has the pressures of everyone around here getting married and having babies as well. I mean, I think one of the take away things from me about this book was try not to act on the thoughts that you're having about yourself because things can very quickly change.

If you just you know don't act on them. Yeah, you can have the thoughts but you know, if you just give it an hour or a day, very often something will happen which will you know, make You very weii from that. Path is really good advice. Actually, Christina when we do first aid, Mental Health, First Aid training, or suicide awareness training that is very much one of the first techniques that people can call on to you. So, if anybody reading this book or listening to this podcast, have feelings that may have been stirred up within them.

Like you say, one of the best things to do, other than reaching out for help itself in the moment, when your feelings for really intense is to distract yourself to say to yourself, okay? I'm Not going to do anything. Now, I'm going to try and get through this next hour, this next moment, this next, 30 minutes. And, and to go on from there is actually a really helpful techniques in itself. Yeah. And not to forget as well. Samaritans, are there 24/7? Absolutely. You do ever feel that you need someone to talk to gonna wrap this podcast up soon.

But before we do, I want to go around and ask you what was your takeaway from this? But I've already said what mine is ready but what was your takeaway from it? Joe. Don't dwell on, regress. Don't need to think too much. Leave it alone, leave that book alone. Able to stop dwelling on regret since reading the book. Sometimes. I'm okay at it. Other times, I get sucked into the black hole and there's no Escape. It's not very easy, is it Tony? What do you do? Take away from it. I think perspective and this is how you look at things.

It doesn't make it right necessarily. You know there's other ways. And if you see things through different eyes or a different perspective, you know, yeah, things aren't always what you think they are. So if it taught me anything it was reinforcing. I think that message you know, you see what you will. You look and you see you know, if your version of it and you sometimes miss things. Yeah, absolutely. You see them? Yeah. And what would you take away from it? Sorry the power of imagination and reading being such a wonderful tool to escape yourself when you don't have the physical means, you know, to were walking to parallel universes.

I feel just reading about these lives refreshed, me and made me think about all kinds of alternative Futures and you know, even if they're never going to pass and ever going to be real to think about your life in different ways and to have that hope. And that excitement about life is what it's all about. And Just to remind yourself of the power of imagination, really?

Whoa, so that's our podcast done for this evening. Thanks for listening. We'll be back in about a month's time when we'll be talking about kazuo, ishiguro's Clara and the sun. If you want to follow us, please captures on Instagram and Twitter and you can listen to our podcasts on anchor. FM Spotify, Google and apple podcasts.