“Memory Man” (post 1) by David Baldacci: Amos Decker thought his brain “seemed to have a mind of its own”

Decker, a 42-year-old detective, is preoccupied with the fact that someone has just confessed to the unsolved murder of his family—wife, daughter, and brother-in-law—several years ago.

“He wanted to see this guy. Smell this guy. Size him up…He was thinking back to what he once was [before his ability to work and function had markedly deteriorated, in reaction to the murder of his family]. He thought about this often, even when he didn’t want to. Sometimes, most of the time, the decision wasn’t up to him. It was up to his brain, which, ironically enough, seemed to have a mind of its own” (1, p. 30).

Comment: The essence of alternate personalities in multiple personality is that they seem to have minds of their own, which was the essential finding in a study of how fiction writers experience their characters (2). 

Thus, the author, David Baldacci, while highlighting his protagonist’s “hyperthymesia” (he never forgets anything) (1, p. 30), has also, perhaps unintentionally, given him the psychology of fiction writers, which is the psychology of multiple personality trait, my own interpretation of that study (2).

1. David Baldacci. Memory Man. New York, Grand Central Publishing, 2015.

2. Marjorie Taylor, Sara D. Hodges, Adèle Kohányi. “The Illusion of Independent Agency: Do Adult Fiction Writers Experience Their Characters as Having Minds of Their Own?” Imagination, Cognition and Personality, Vol. 22(4) 361-380, 2002-2003.https://pages.uoregon.edu/hodgeslab/files/Download/Taylor%20Hodges%20Kohanyi_2003.pdf