Soul Sharing

Is anything truly fiction?

Do you ever read a book and think, I must meet this author because clearly we share a soul? Of course, that thought is premised on the notion that authors write novels based on their own experiences of the world, which I have to think is true for most of them out there. “Write what you know” and all that. But even if that weren’t universally the case (we’re talking about the genre of fiction after all, and I by no means want to diminish the power of authors’ imaginations and creativity), I’d still love to meet any author who can so compellingly put to paper the complex feelings and thoughts that I so often find myself feeling and thinking, yet utterly failing to describe in any meaningful way (so far, this post feels like a good example of that). Enter Lynn Steger Strong and her astonishing novel, The Float Test.

The story takes place mostly in Florida and centers around a dysfunctional family, that is to say, a family. Some really messed up things happen in this book, but I found each of the characters to be believable and relatable. So much so that, yes, I wonder whether the author herself experienced any of these things, or whether she herself is like any of these characters (or, more likely, whether she is close to people who are like these characters, or who at least share similar traits with them). Or does this author simply have a wild, wonderful imagination that happened to conjure thoughts, feelings, and experiences that are nearly identical to my own?

At the end of the day, it doesn’t matter, but it makes me feel a certain kinship with the author and desperate to read more of her work (Flight quickly rose to the top of my TBR list). In fact, The Float Test spoke to me so deeply that, at first, I hesitated to recommend it to others as vehemently as I would want to, lest they start to wonder which of the dark souls in the book is most like my own; in this case, a recommendation felt tantamount to an admission of some kind. But I am, of course, sharing this recommendation, because this is what reading, and writing, is all about—expressing vulnerabilities and (hopefully) connecting with others as a result. Besides, I don’t think you need to see yourself in any of the characters in this book in order to enjoy it. The Float Test is a stunning, wildly entertaining novel in its own right, even if—maybe especially if—you find the characters utterly foreign and repellent.