BASIC CONCEPTS

— When novelists claim they do not invent it, but hear voices and find stories in their head, they are neither joking nor crazy.

— When characters, narrators, or muses have minds of their own and occasionally take over, they are alternate personalities.

— Alternate personalities and memory gaps, but no significant distress or dysfunction, is a normal version of multiple personality.

— normal Multiple Personality Trait (MPT) (core of Multiple Identity Literary Theory), not clinical Multiple Personality Disorder (MPD)

— The normal version of multiple personality is an asset in fiction writing when some alternate personalities are storytellers.

— Multiple personality originates when imaginative children with normal brains have unassuaged trauma as victim or witness.

— Psychiatrists, whose standard mental status exam fails to ask about memory gaps, think they never see multiple personality.

— They need the clue of memory gaps, because alternate personalities don’t acknowledge their presence until their cover is blown.

— In novels, most multiple personality, per se, is unnoticed, unintentional, and reflects the author’s view of ordinary psychology.

— Multiple personality means one person who has more than one identity and memory bank, not psychosis or possession.

— Euphemisms for alternate personalities include parts, pseudonyms, alter egos, doubles, double consciousness, voice or voices.

— Multiple personality trait: 90% of fiction writers; possibly 30% of public.

— Each time you visit, search "name index" or "subject index," choose another name or subject, and search it.

— If you read only recent posts, you miss most of what this site has to offer.

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Thursday, July 17, 2025

"One of Us Knows” (post 1) A Thriller by Alyssa Cole (1) whose protagonist is explicitly diagnosed as having Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID) (a.k.a. Multiple PersonalityDisorder (MPD)

Back Cover: “Years after a breakdown and a diagnosis of dissociative identity disorder derailed her career as a historical preservationist, Kenetria Nash and her alters [alternate personalities] have been given a second chance they can’t refuse: a position as resident caretaker of a historic home on an isolated island in [New York’s] Hudson River (2, Back Cover).


In her Acknowledgments, the author thanks "Calion Winter, the DID accuracy consultant for this story. His early advice about potential plot missteps…were invaluable" (2, p. 336).


Comment: I hope to start reading this “Thriller” in the near future. I don’t know Calion Winter, the author’s multiple personality consultant.


1. Wikipedia. “Alyssa Cole.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alyssa_Cole

2. Alyssa Cole. One of Us Knows. New York, William Morrow/HarperCollins, 2024.

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