The Ring of Truth

A writer who hopes to connect with the reader, must write in a believable way. No matter how fantastic the location, situation or characters, there must be a core sense that the character may actually have felt, spoken or acted in the way described. A book of any sort that achieves credibility in this way has a 'ring of truth'. The settings and situations may be unfamiliar, but there is an understanding of the character's thinking and motivation because they resonate with the reader as essentially true.
What gives the ring of truth is the essential shared experience of being human, knowing people like that, being people like that. From the time I was a child I noticed 2 things about people: everyone is unique; and everyone is the same. At 16 I expressed it this way:

People

We all believe we feel

Unlike any other

We think we are the only one

Searching for true brothers

We know that no-one understands….

At least we all suppose that

But each think of life, of death and beyond

We love, we hate, we carry on

We face the inner struggles of our own morality

We face the outer world of our own making

And we see

The struggles of the others going on in other places

They stare back at us

But look they have our faces