“Set in New Orleans, this important and powerful novel follows the Boisdoré family . . . in the months after Katrina. A profound, moving and authentically detailed picture of the storm’s emotional impact on those who lived through it.” — People In this dazzling debut about family, home, and grief, C. Morgan Babst takes readers into the heart of Hurricane Katrina and the life of a great city. As the storm is fast approaching the Louisiana coast, Cora Boisdoré refuses to leave the city. Her parents, Joe Boisdoré, an artist descended from freed slaves who became the city’s preeminent furniture makers, and his white “Uptown” wife, Dr. Tess Eshleman, are forced to evacuate without her, setting off a chain of events that leaves their marriage in shambles and Cora catatonic—the victim or perpetrator of some violence mysterious even to herself. This mystery is at the center of Babst’s haunting and profound novel. Cora’s sister, Del, returns to New Orleans from the successful life she built in New York City to find her hometown in ruins and her family deeply alienated from one another. As Del attempts to figure out what happened to her sister, she must also reckon with the racial history of the city and the trauma of a disaster that was not, in fact, some random act of God but an avoidable tragedy visited on New Orleans’s most vulnerable citizens. Separately and together, each member of the Boisdoré clan must find the strength to remake home in a city forever changed. The Floating World is the Katrina story that needed to be told—one with a piercing, unforgettable loveliness and a vivid, intimate understanding of this particular place and its tangled past. “Set in New Orleans, this important and powerful novel follows the Boisdoré family . . . in the months after Katrina. A profound, moving and authentically detailed picture of the storm’s emotional impact on those who lived through it.” — People "C. Morgan Babst's portrait of a troubled New Orleans family that fractures further during and after Hurricane Katrina is poetic and suspenseful . . . an ambitious novel." —NPR.org "Powerful . . . Babst is most effective at conveying the emotional weight of the tragedy when she presents it alongside vibrant characters and story lines. One of the most vibrant is the family patriarch, Vincent, whom Babst brings to life in a portrayal that’s impressively unrestrained, even Faulknerian." — The New York Times Book Review “This is a spot-on examination of race and the tumult natural disasters leave in their wake.” — Marie Claire “This powerful family drama (with a mystery at its core) promises to be an emotional read. A dazzling debut about family, home, and grief, The Floating World takes readers into the heart of Hurricane Katrina with the story of the Boisdorés, whose roots stretch back nearly to the foundation of New Orleans.” — Paste Magazine “This unforgettable and timely novel tells the story of those who lost everything in the hurricane and the lives they sought to rebuild.” — RealSimple.com “In the wake of hurricanes Harvey and Irma, Babst's mystery about a southern family dealing with the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina—and a mentally ill family member who opted to stay behind during the storm—is oddly prescient.” — InStyle.com “Set in New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, this wrenching and hypnotic book will give you chills with its descriptions of the flooding.” — Bustle “As hurricane victims begin the arduous process of recovering and rebuilding their communities, The Floating World offers a fictional, but very real, example of the struggles they’ll face. What becomes of those harmed by natural disasters after the news cameras leave and attention is diverted to the next human crisis? That’s the question at the center of The Floating World , a book that will surely give its readers empathy for all those who are putting their lives back together.” — BitchMedia “One of the best novels of 2017. The Floating World is a lived-in meditation on the meaning of home, and what happens when home suffers a blow born of both natural disaster and human negligence. It's a reminder that compassion has limitations, and that the aftermath can be as bad as or worse than the storm.” — The Dallas Morning News “ The Floating World is a beautiful novel that speaks profoundly to the current moment.” — Chicago Review of Books “This debut novel . . . is the Katrina story that still needs to be told.” — Birmingham Magazine   “The Floating World  is the Katrina story that needed to be told, one with a piercing, unforgettable loveliness and a nuanced understanding of this particular place and its tangled past.” — Deep South Magazine “A soulful inquiry of race, class, and family in the dawn of trauma, The Floating World doesn’t just look into the eye of such a devastating storm. The storm itself becomes the lens through which the Boisdorés begin to see the world more clearly. Thro