“James Patterson by James Patterson (post 3): Proof that if an author’s rational characters hear voices in their head, the author probably does, too

In a past post, from Patterson’s novel Along Came a Spider, I quoted a passage in which the protagonist, Alex Cross, heard voices in his head. And I have quoted the same kind of thing from many other novels. I have inferred that this reflected the way that the author’s mind worked, which is proved by the following:

“Five or six weeks after [anesthesia for] the operation on my lung, my imagination wasn’t working so well. I was present, but I wasn’t present. That occasionally clever little voice in my head that usually asks, What about this? What about that?—there was no voice. I was no longer mildly schizophrenic.

“I wasn’t liking it. It was a bit frightening and, honestly, kind of sad. I was lonely without the voice in my head…Then, slowly, my imagination came back. Now I think it’s working pretty well” (1, p. 314).

Comment: When he says, “I wasn’t present” without the voice, he implies that the voice was part of who he was, the voice of an alternate personality who had a mind of its own and could advise him.

1. James Patterson. James Patterson by James Patterson: The Stories of my Life. New York, Little, Brown and Company, 2022.