27 Fabulous Books Like The Midnight Library

Book Summary

One decision can change everything – even though we rarely realize it in the moment. After a decade of moving from city to city for meaningless jobs, 29-year-old Hannah has moved to her hometown of LA and is staying with her best friend, Gabby. One night the two go to a bar where Hannah bumps into her high school boyfriend, Ethan. When Gabby asks Hannah if she’s ready to head home, Ethan offers to give her a ride if she wants to stay and visit with him a bit longer. What will happen if she leaves with Gabby? And what will happen if she stays with Ethan?

In concurrent storylines told in alternating chapters, 29-year-old Hannah lives out two very different versions of her future based on this one decision. As these two different realities play out, this story raises questions about fate, true love, and the concept of soul mates.

Book Summary

By day, Kitty is a single woman who owns a bookstore in Denver with her best friend, Frieda. In 1962, it was unconventional for a woman of her age to be an unmarried business owner, but she enjoyed having complete control over her day-to-day life without a husband to answer to. However, there was a man in her life once that she might have considered marrying—a doctor named Kevin.

But at night, Kitty leads an alternate life in her dreams. In this dream reality, Kitty goes by Katharyn, and the year is 1963. She’s married to the love of her life, a man named Lars. Together they live in an elegant Denver home and have triplets.

This life is everything she once thought she wanted, and at first, Kitty enjoys her nightly visits to this alternate reality. But soon, Kitty begins to find Katharyn’s life irresistible. As the lines between her real life and her dream life begin to blur, she wonders if she can choose the life she wants—and if so, at what cost?

Book Summary

This story begins on the day our main character is born in 1978. In one version of reality, Louis David Alder is born male. In an alternate reality, Louise Dawn Alder is born female. In both versions of the story, Louis and Louise grow up in the same Maine town, with the same parents, and even the same friends. Both have the same dream to become a writer. 

This book allows us to look at one life in two different ways. From childhood through adulthood, we see the ways in which Louis and Louise’s lives are the same and the ways in which they are treated differently because of gender. 

On the night of their high school graduation, Louis and Louise each experience a life-changing event that will cause them to leave their hometown until they are eventually called back many years later.

Book Summary

This book poses a question very similar to the one in The Midnight Library: If you could turn back the clock, would you choose a different life?

Ben loves the month of December, but this year everything feels different. His marriage to Daphne has become very strained. They bicker and snip at each other constantly, making it hard for him to feel the usual magic of the season. When he gets a call from his old friend Alice, his mind starts racing with questions. He’s always thought of Alice as the one who got away, but now he wonders how things might have been different if he’d ended up with her.

After purchasing a watch on Christmas Eve, Ben wakes up the next morning to discover that it’s December 5th – but he’s back in his college dorm room in 2005. This was the very day that, fifteen years earlier, he first kissed Daphne. But what if he’d kissed Alice instead? Now he’ll have the chance to make that decision all over again. What if he chooses differently this time?

Book Summary

When a flight attendant tells passengers to prepare for a crash landing, Dawn braces herself. When the thoughts passing through her mind are of a man she met 15 years before and not her husband, she’s shocked and confused. After she survives, the vision before the crash remains. She had a good life in Boston with her husband and daughter, so why did she think of Wyatt at the end?

When the survivors are given transportation anywhere they want to go after the crash, Dawn has a decision. Should she return to Boston or visit Wyatt in Egypt at the archaeological site she left behind years before? From here, her two potential futures make up the story alongside her long-buried secrets and doubts. 

Book Summary

The same night Lucy quits her thankless job, she encounters two men who could be a part of very different futures. She meets Caleb, a local photographer, and runs into Max, who was once the love of her life. Men aside, she must decide if she should pursue her dreams of being a writer or head to London to revive her career. 

The book is written in concurrent stay versus go storylines, with the “Stay” chapters showing what happens if Lucy stays home to pursue writing and a relationship with Caleb. In the “Go” chapters, you’ll see what happens if Lucy heads to London to be a part of her friend’s house-share and work for a prestigious company. In London, she can also ask Max what really happened ten years ago.

Book Summary

After a chance encounter while they are both in Cologne, Thora and Santi feel instantly connected. They are kindred spirits, but their new relationship lasts only days before a tragic accident. However, they are destined to meet again, and again, and again.

Throughout numerous lives, they meet at different ages and have various relationships – becoming friends, colleagues, lovers, and enemies. But when they start remembering small glimpses of their pasts, they must discover the truth of their mysterious attachment to each other.

Book Summary

While The Midnight Library looks at the different lives Nora could have led if she’d made different decisions along the way, this book takes that concept one step further by examining the possibilities of an entire series of decisions. 

It all begins with two people who met on a street in Cambridge in 1958. They felt an immediate connection, but what happened next? Did they kiss or go their separate ways? If they kissed, did they get married soon after or break up weeks later? Did they get caught up in the monotony of daily life together, or did they only find their way back to each other after years apart?

This book shows three different versions of this couple throughout the decades—from the fifties, sixties, and seventies to 2014.

Book Summary

Brett seems to have it all – a good job, a spacious loft, and a handsome boyfriend. Her life checks all the boxes of where she thinks she’s supposed to be at thirty-four years old. But according to who?

When her mom passes away, Brett is surprised to learn that her inheritance comes with one major stipulation. She must first complete the list of life goals that she penned at the young age of fourteen. She can’t understand what her mom was thinking. Her teenage goals certainly don’t line up with her adult ambitions, and some of them seem downright impossible.

How can she have a relationship with her father, who passed away seven years ago? And how can she become an awesome teacher when she picked a completely different career path?

She reluctantly sets out on the journey her mother has laid before her, and along the way, she’ll discover that sometimes the best things come from unexpected places, and it’s never too late to reinvent your life!

Book Summary

Lucy is very busy – busy despising her job, busy skipping out on her friends, and busy avoiding her family. That doesn’t leave a lot of time to enjoy her life. And her life has taken notice. 

When she gets home one day, she finds a gold envelope waiting for her. Inside is an invitation to meet with Life—her life. She’s been ignoring it, and it wants to talk face to face. 

From the moment Lucy meets the man who introduces himself as her life, he’s ready to get to the bottom of her stories, her questionable choices, and her stubborn half-truths. Lucy may have given up on her life, but it hasn’t given up on her. She will have to learn to tell the truth about what really matters to her.

Book Summary

Eudora has lived a long, full life, but at the age of 85 she’s decided she’s done with it all. She’s already witnessed the indignities and suffering of old age, and she wants the end – her end – to be on her own terms. She’s called a clinic in Switzerland to set her plan into motion. But then she meets 10-year-old Rose.

Rose is rainbows and sparkles and cheer. And as much as Eudora just wants to be left alone, she can’t help but be drawn into her young neighbor’s world of adventure. Along with her affable and recently widowed neighbor Stanley, they join Rose for afternoon teas, shopping sprees, trips to the beach, and birthday celebrations. As they all await the arrival of Rose’s new baby sister, Eudora is secretly waiting for approval to go ahead with her plan.

As this unlikely trio grows closer, the joy that her new friends bring to her life forces Eudora to reconsider whether she’s really ready to say goodbye.

Book Summary

Chloe’s career success has required personal sacrifice, including missing time with her family. She’s finally ready to change. Chloe books a trip home, but sadly her mom passes away just hours before her plane lands. Chloe is full of regret and grief about missing precious time with her mother. 

But then, inexplicably, days before the funeral, Chloe finds her mom alive and well. She’s been transported back in time three months to March, and no one around her understands her confusion. But she’s determined to do everything differently in this second chance.

Book Summary

Mae has spent every Christmas since her birth at the same snowy Utah cabin. Knowing it’s the last year they’ll spend at the cabin, feeling trapped in a job she hates, and having just made a big mistake in the romance department leaves her feeling totally hopeless.

When her Christmas wish is for clarity on what will make her truly happy, she sets herself into a Groundhog Day experience of re-living the same day until she can get it right and connect with her true love. But don’t worry, the repetition doesn’t go overboard. Soon, the story will continue moving forward, and you’ll find yourself very invested in Mae’s romantic fate.

Book Summary

Jen is waiting up for her 17-year-old son to come home one night in late October. Through the window, she witnesses the unthinkable. Her son kills a man right there in the street outside their home and is taken into custody.

She goes to sleep that night, wishing it was all just a bad dream, and then she wakes up yesterday. The next day she wakes up the day before yesterday.

Day after day, she wakes up another day earlier and has another opportunity to stop the murder if only she can figure out what caused her son to commit the crime in the first place.

Book Summary

Emilie has a TERRIBLE Valentine’s Day. It’s so bad that she escapes to her grandmother’s for some comfort and ice cream therapy. Emilie crashes on the couch, only to wake up back home in her home bed. She’s not thrilled to discover that it’s Valentine’s Day morning all over again.

She’s stuck in a time loop, waking up to see her boyfriend cheating on her day after day. And why does she keep running into Nick in unfortunate ways? How many days will she have to endure re-living her life going up in flames?

Book Summary

In this YA novel described as Groundhog’s Day meets Mean Girls, Samantha is the most popular girl in her high school. For her, “Cupid Day” should be a fun time full of Valentines and roses. Instead, she dies in a terrible accident that evening. 

But then she wakes up the next morning and relives the same day again. And then again. Eventually, she lives this day seven times while realizing that even small daily choices create massive overall changes to the lives of others.

Book Summary

This book is NOT what you’d expect from Stephen King. Instead of horror, you’ll find a suspenseful historical fiction crossed with science fiction (and even a twist of romance) that addresses the most compelling aspect of time travel – how actions taken in the past affect the same future you started in.

English teacher Jake Epping is recruited by his friend Al, the owner of the local diner, to help with the most unlikely of requests. Al discovered a portal in the diner’s storeroom that transports him back in time to the era of Ike and Elvis, and he becomes obsessed with the idea of using to the portal to go back in time and stop the assassination of John F. Kennedy. But when he realizes he won’t be able to complete the mission himself, he enlists Jake for the job.

Before Jake tackles the challenge of stopping the Kennedy assassination, he first hopes to change the course of history for Harry, one of his adult students whose father murdered his mother and siblings back in 1958.

Book Summary

In this emotional rollercoaster, Dannie Kohan is a rising Manhattan attorney who just nailed an important job interview and then got engaged. She’s had one heck of a great day and goes to bed confident that she’s on track to achieve her five-year plan.

When she wakes up, she finds herself in a different apartment, with a different ring on her finger, and next to a different man. It’s still December 15th – but it’s now 2025, five years later. One intense and shocking hour later, Dannie wakes up again back in 2020.

Was it all a very realistic dream? She decides it must have been and tries to forget all about it. But the memory is suddenly brought back to the surface when, four and a half years later, Dannie meets the man from her dream.

Book Summary

If you could find out exactly how many years you have left to live, would you want to know?

On the same day, all around the world, every person over the age of 22 receives an identical box. Inside each is a string. At first, no one knows what the strings mean, but it soon becomes apparent that a long string means long life and a short string foretells a life cut short.

As society responds to the revelation of the boxes, each person must make a choice – do you want to know how long you will live? If so, what will you do with that knowledge? And what if your choice is different from those you care about most?

These are the dilemmas facing the eight protagonists in The Measure, whose fates become interwoven as their individual stories unfold.

Book Summary

Alice Love is 29, madly in love with her husband, and pregnant with her first child. At least, that’s the last thing she remembers. When Alice wakes up on the floor of the gym and is whisked off to the hospital, she discovers that it’s actually 2008, not 1998, she has three kids, and she’s getting divorced. As she tries to reconstruct what she’s forgotten about the past decade, she also hopes to reconstruct the life she remembers. Ultimately, she’ll have to decide whether she really wants her old life back.

Book Summary

On the morning of Alice’s 40th birthday, she wakes up in 1996, which was the year she turned 16. Having her adolescent body and seeing her high school crush are both surprising, but being reunited with her 40-something father is the biggest shock. He’s so charming and healthy, unlike his ailing 64-year-old body she’s used to.

With 24 years of extra life experience in her brain, Alice has a brand new perspective on events from the past. Her life at 40 isn’t bad. She likes her job, apartment, romantic status, and long-time best friend. So, should she try to change anything while she’s in the past?

Book Summary

Carol and Katy have been planning a mother-daughter trip to Positano, the magical Italian seaside town where Carol spent a summer long ago. But when Carol dies before the trip, Katy is faced with embarking on the adventure alone.

As soon as 30-year-old Katy steps foot on the Amalfi Coast, she can feel her mother’s spirit. She’s taking in the beautiful views and delicious food when her mother appears – but not the mother she just lost. Instead, she meets a healthy, tanned, 30-year-old version of her mother. For One Italian Summer, Katy gets to know Carol, not as her mom, but as the younger woman her mother used to be. Through her encounters with the 30-year-old version of her mom, Katy is inspired to reconsider her own life choices.

Book Summary

While Georgie knows that she and her husband Neal deeply love each other, their marriage has been in trouble for many years as they don’t always like each other anymore. The family is heading to Omaha for Christmas, but once again, Georgie’s work intervenes in their life. She needs to stay in LA for the holidays and knows Neal will be upset, but she doesn’t expect him to take the girls on the trip without her. 

Georgie is devastated that she may have ruined her marriage for good and is even more upset when she can’t get ahold of Neal. When the cell phones don’t work, she tries the old landline at her mom’s house. When she’s finally able to reach Neal, it’s not exactly the 2013 Neal that left. It’s the 1998 version of Neal. Speaking to the past helps Georgie rethink the choices that got them to where they are today.