So I lined them up next to the bed, kind of as follows. I have noted publication dates and which are biographies/case studies and which are autobiographies.

1988	Through Divided Minds by Robert Mayer	Case studies
1991	Satan's Children by Robert Mayer	Case studies
1987	Nightmare by Lucy Freeman	Biography
1991	Jennifer and Her Selves by Dr. Gerald Schoenewolf	Case study
1995	The Magic Daughter by Jane Phillips	Autobiography
1991	The Flock by Joan Frances Casey	Autobiography
1997	Silencing the Voices by Jean Darby Cline	Autobiography
1987	When Rabbit Howls by the troops for Truddi Chase	Autobiography
1999	First Person Plural by Cameron West	Autobiography

I was struck by how things are gradually changing in the multiple literature. The first that hit me was that the case studies imposed a generally entirely different language on the experience. As one might expect, the language was more clinical. It also tended to be more overblown. The most dramatic example was Nightmare which seemed to be one long dissertation on pitying someone who was multiple. Jennifer was particularly horrifying in that it was really the story of a therapist that crosses the line to enmeshment with a client, and she displays a lot of fake integrations and things to please him. Or at least it seemed that way to me. I had a hard time finishing that one.

However there was some hope in Robert Mayer's books. While he was clearly under the same influences as other therapists were in the 1980s, he explained how his own perceptions were changed. His look at SRA was particularly touching to me as he was willing to deal with his own doubts very openly.

The autobiographies were also showing some development, at least in my opinion. When Rabbit Howls was about the first and really prescient, if you ask me. The problem with it for me has always been that it's so open that it's almost bizarrely hard to follow. Of course this may be me just not following it. But it reads a lot like confusion to me - in other words, it expresses almost too clearly the process it describes.

It is also very much a survivor book, and follows in a way the revenge plot. But it is also just a plain old unique book. More in a minute.

The Flock, Silencing, and The Magic Daughter all to me fit a model which I call the "integration story." Multiple comes to therapy, discovers she is multiple, and the kind and gentle therapist (this guide is critical) helps her to integrate. All is well. This is not to negate them. The Flock to me is the first book that demonstrates how talented and functional a multiple can be. Silencing was probably the most disturbing -- not because of the actual book, but because of the husband's postscript where he says "I believe my wife split only into as many pieces as she needed to." Um... all right. How smart of her. The Magic Daughter expresses a lot of day to day struggles, and sometimes comes off a bit whiny. But I kind of appreciated the minutiae of it.

First Person Plural is not a book that I totally enjoyed. I got all wrapped up in how the guy had to quit his job immediately upon diagnosis and how rich he was and how a lot of the book seemed to be an apology to his wife. But after lining up all these books, it struck me that other than Truddi Chase's book, it is the only one that offers no integration - and no apologies.

It also is a book where the protagonist - Cameron - switches therapists several times as a matter of course. The therapist is not as central to the story as the process that he follows. And to some extent the abuse takes a back seat.

Out of this small sample of a small body of literature I got a sense of movement that I'm finding quite empowering.

The first thing is the change of language and description when it comes to members of a multiple system or "alters." Cameron West's book opens with a description of "My Guys." The Flock is again a description of a group of equal members. In the earliest or therapist-based literature there is a frequent tendency to impose a hierarchy, to talk about alters and memory traces/keepers, and blah blah blah. So in a way things are moving away from putting people in boxes like bacteria.

The second is the loss of the therapist as central. In the earliest literature it seems that the therapists were the writers. Then the clients started writing as well. Finally the therapist drops out as the critical catalyst. The multiple system itself becomes the star of the show.

The third is the role of abuse. Understandably, a lot of the literature focuses on tracking down "WHY am I multiple" and walking through the horror of memory. But gradually a sense emerges of the present; the multiple as a way of living now, as opposed to a series of puzzle pieces to the past.

Through all this, Truddi Chase's book remains a kind of enigma, for here her system has chosen to describe the inner world without a central narrator (that's easy to find). The result for me as a reader is distraction; I'm obsessing with point of view and chronology. However it may be the most authentic. I think this took unique courage and really incredible talent. I am a bit uncomfortable with it though because I think it has set public perception on edge a bit. It's hard to understand... therefore they may have stopped listening, at least up to First Person Plural. This is in no way the author's responsibility. But for me as a reader who has a personal stake in the multiplicity, it makes me uncomfortable.

So I left the weekend with a sense of movement. I think that the transition from therapist written literature to first person literature has been largely a positive one that is nearly complete. I also felt that the sense that one started to develop about multiple systems being in a sense self-driven towards health - that it didn't depend on one therapist dragging them along kicking and screaming - is hugely positive. It gave me a sense of hope that more stories will continue to be told that express the fullness of multiplicity and not just abuse, abuse, hardship, integration.

And so, dearest reader, when you venture forth into the literature may you find truth and good writing, in that order, and keep your critical hat on.