If you crossed It’s a Wonderful Life with a pinch of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, you would have a decent idea of what to expect from Matt Haig’s latest mind-bending sci-fi/fantasy classic, THE MIDNIGHT TRAIN.

Imagine that a trip to your personal eternity takes place on a random mode of transportation, say a train. Your guide on this journey is someone who you held in high regard while on earth and allows you to relive, as a ghostly witness, various moments of your life. This is what happens to Wilbur, whose best days were with the love he lost, Maggie. Reliving these times makes him wish he could have done things differently and had another outcome for his life. To do so means that he might risk everything --- even his place in eternity.

"[I]n much the same vein as THE MIDNIGHT LIBRARY, this excursion into the unknown and the fine line between life and death is very much a grand adventure to be experienced and cherished."

When Wilbur passes away at the age of 81, he is as clueless about what comes next as anyone else on the planet. The opening chapter depicts possibly the happiest time of his life, his honeymoon in Venice, Italy, with Maggie. He would give anything to have that moment again and the opportunity to make different decisions that eventually would not tear their relationship apart. Now, he finds himself aboard a mysterious train with the long-deceased bookshop owner he always loved and respected, Agnes Bagdale, who is there to guide him on his journey on The Midnight Train, which eventually will take him to his own eternity.

Before he arrives there, The Midnight Train will make a bunch of stops at various points in Wilbur’s life, each of which he must observe like a ghost from a Charles Dickens novel. Should he do anything to interfere, it could not only jeopardize his eternity but also cause a splintering within the timeline of his life, essentially creating an alternate version of it that could cause more harm then anyone can measure. That temptation will exist in many instances, especially those involving Maggie and seeing how the choices he made led him to lose the greatest love he had ever known.

There is more regret than just his love life. Wilbur relives the tragic death of his older brother, Doug, but this time he looks at it through adult eyes rather than the eyes of his youth, and the revelations about Doug are startling and quite affecting to him. Agnes asks Wilbur flat out how it feels to watch the very worst moment of his life and not be able to do anything to prevent it, as is the case with reliving the car accident he survived but that claimed Doug.

Agnes also warns Wilbur about his behavior, especially in past moments involving Maggie and a distant memory where he kisses her well before the moment he actually did in his lifetime. She feels the train car shake as something may be happening to his eternal lifeline as a result of his actions. The story takes a darker turn when another incarnation of Wilbur’s identity, The Dreamer, enters the action as a result of the changes made to his lifeline. This also alters the rules, and there is potential peril for both Wilbur’s eternal life and the existence of The Dreamer.

There is one extremely brief chapter that consists of a single sentence, but it’s a powerful one that I believe best conveys the story’s action: “The incredibly annoying thing about being dead was that you got all your priorities in order, just when it was too late to do anything about them.” Matt Haig indeed has a way with words, and in much the same vein as THE MIDNIGHT LIBRARY, this excursion into the unknown and the fine line between life and death is very much a grand adventure to be experienced and cherished.