A library between life and death lets one woman try every life she could have lived.
Who drives the story
A woman from Bedford buried under regrets, who tries to die and instead gets to try on every life she might have lived. She wants a life without loss; she learns to want her own life, losses included.
The school librarian who broke the news of Nora's father's death with a chessboard, and the manifestation who guides her through the Midnight Library. Compassionate, patient, and the voice that keeps insisting living is the only teacher.
Nora's brother, whose band she left and whose death haunts several alternate lives. Alive in the root life, he confesses his own alcoholism and heartbreak, and lets his sister help him rebuild.
The kind surgeon Nora once stood up for coffee, whose alternate-life marriage offers the most seductive glimpse of happiness. His life with Molly and Plato shows Nora the difference between a beautiful life and her life.
Also in the story
Nora's ex-fiancé, whose alternate marriage reveals he was unfaithful all along. Choosing him would have cost her everything she wanted.
Nora's neighbor, at whose door she collapses after the overdose. He is the first hand that pulls her back into the living world.
Nora's friend, reconnected after the library, who tells her that piano student Leo still wants lessons. Part of the web of small, real connections Nora rebuilds.
How they are connected
The school librarian who broke the news of Nora's father's death with a chessboard, and the manifestation who guides her through the Midnight Library.
Nora's brother, whose band she left and whose death haunts several alternate lives.
The kind surgeon Nora once stood up for coffee, whose alternate-life marriage offers the most seductive glimpse of happiness.
Nora's ex-fiancé, whose alternate marriage reveals he was unfaithful all along.
Nora's neighbor, at whose door she collapses after the overdose.
Nora's friend, reconnected after the library, who tells her that piano student Leo still wants lessons.
Go deeper
Regret as a weight you carry · The myth of the perfect life · Choice and authorship · Depression and the will to live
Themes explainedThe full story act by act, the ending explained and a quick quiz.
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