Incomplete Plural Stories List

[lb_lee]

Very incomplete list of stories with major plural characters or themes ranging from "plural author says it's about their plurality" to "sci-fi sorta-soulbonders in spaaaaace." Quality not guaranteed, content warnings spotty. Mostly ignoring well-known, easy-to-find biographies and non-narrative nonfiction. Plural creators preferred. Mediums so far include prose, film, zines, comics, kinetic essays, and video games.

(See also: Cubewell's itch.io collection, About Plurals By Plurals, the old archive for Nita and Anita's Multiple Personality and Dissociation Book List, and the Dragonheart Collective's Plurals In Media blog.)

Barker, Meg-John. ChalkBoard Comic. (2018). A young child is trapped in a room, crunching equations. Headmates swoop in to help out.

Barrette, Elizabeth. Polychrome Heroics. (2013-present). Maisie Walker was an ordinary college student until she was kidnapped by a telepathic supervillain. Under the onslaught of telepathic assault, Maisie became a multiple system, who developed into a superhero called Damask. (Alternate link because I can't tell if my browser is glitching due to me or the site being down.)

Coville, Bruce. Aliens Stole My Body. (1998). Last book in a four book children's series where the human boy protagonist spends 90% of the story as the headmate of a six-legged, one-eyed, no-mouth-or-hands alien named Seymour, and having very little fronting power. There's also a movie version from 2020 that toned down the multi stuff.

Clell, Madison. Cuckoo. (1996-2002). Autobiographical true stories of being a multiple. Sometimes serious, sometimes goofy. Abuse content.

Emezi, Akwaeke. Freshwater. (2018). Nigerian body-sharing from an Igbo ogbanje perspective, fictionalized autobiography. Abuse content.

Emezi, Akwaeke. Dear Senthuran: A Black Spirit Memoir. (2021). Haven't read it yet, don't have details.

Emmengard. The Blobbies. (2019-present). A comic about the DID experience. Textually transcribed. Check out their other comics!

Frost, Sean and Wendi Strang-Frost. Johnny Public. (2001-2007?) A comic noir series about William Denn's search for identity, a quest that is complicated by the number of people that control his body. The first arc was completed; the second is incomplete and involves aliens.

Friedman, C.S. This Alien Shore. (1998). Multiple fleeing for her life in space amidst a space opera backdrop that includes a society built around being as disability- and weird-friendly as possible (while still being just as full of intrigue and bad behavior as anywhere else). Enjoyed that world more than I did the plural themself.

Grove, Emma. The Third Person. (2022). 800-page comics memoir about a messed-up therapy relationship and being gatekept out of transitioning due to DID.

Hiiro, Reiichi. Romantic Illusions (or, in romanized Japanese, Nōnai Renai no Susume). (2009). A very VERY boys love manga about the sexual and romantic misadventures of a small system of three that start as boyfriends, then get their own corporeal boyfriends over time. It is ridiculous tropey unrealistic cheese, and I enjoyed it disproportionately. Dubious consent, one headmate gets with his therapist, another takes home a high school boy, emotional abuse mentioned.

Inmara Ktletaccete Fenumera. The Sunspot Chronicles. (2022). Stories of a group of plural people who are friends with each other, as they explore the ancient generational starship that is their home.

Kingsley, Nikolai. Cache. (2002). A short sci-fi story about a multiple and two singlets going treasure hunting in space.

Kojima, Akira. Mahoraba. (2000-2006) Romantic comedy manga. Narutaki-Sou is filled with characteristic and eccentric people. However, the most eccentric person is Kozue, the manager. She has a secret of which even she does not know; when she is shocked at something, her personality changes.

Kon, Satoshi, dir. Paprika. (2006). Japanese animated movie about a group of therapists working on an experimental device that allows people to enter each other's dreams. When the device is stolen, reality starts unraveling like a cheap sock. The title character is a therapist's headmate, who does the dreamwork. Reality-trippy and disturbing imagery (including an attempted mind-rape), but very good.

Konigsburg, E. L. (george). (1970). A precocious young boy's headmate notices something amiss with his friend at school, and tries to get to the bottom of it. Don't care for the ending, but I can safely say I've never seen anyone else use it, and the book explicitly states that headmate George is someone to be treated with respect.

Lee, LB. If you're looking at this, you probably already know who we are. My only plural narratives available right now are LB Goes to Alaska, Alter Boys In Love, All In The Family, and the Cultiples Series, all nonfiction. I promise I'll put Battle the Universe back up again someday...

McGee, American. American McGee's Alice. (2000). A very Hot Topic computer game where Alice of Wonderland fame goes into a trauma coma and hacks and slashes her way out of a very hostile headspace.

McGee, American. Alice: Madness Returns. (2011). Alice's Wonderland is decaying and being tampered with by outside forces. Time to pick up the Vorpal blade and hack and slash through some more inner demons!

McGee, American. Alice: Otherlands. (2015). Short animated films this time, not a video game. Alice enters the mindspaces of Jules Verne and Richard Wagner and helps them deal with their own psyches.

McMillen, Edmund. The Binding of Isaac. (2011-present) A computer game following an abused child and his possible-headmates fighting through randomly generated dungeons filled with poop, trauma, and abortions. Offense guaranteed.

McNeil, Carla Speed. Finder: Dream Sequence. (Later omnibused into The Finder Library, vol. 2) (2011). Magri White hosts a massive MMO game inside his head, until one day, his mind rebels, and his inner demon starts attacking players. Paracosm exploration and psychodrama ensues. Also headmate smooching.

MysticEden. Today. (2015-2020). Our daily adventures as a DID (Dissociative Identity Disorder) system.

Packbat. Driftself. (2021?) A kinetic essay, a venting of complicated feelings about race springing from being both black and white.

Rocket. Multiplayer Brain. (2016-2017). A comic about multiple systems and retro gaming nostalgia. On hiatus.

R.O.S.C.O.E. Ouroboros: A Plural Zine about why being plural has made it hard to make a plural zine etc. Link is to textual transcription; right now you can only buy it from me for $3. Drop me a line.

Ruff, Matt. Set This House in Order. (2003). Andy's system has everything stabilized and figured out... until they meet another multiple who hasn't realized they are yet. Shenanigans ensue.

Silverberg, Robert. Multiples. (1983) A singlet with a kink for multiples goes trawling the multi bars in San Francisco, trying to pick one up.

SoftAnnaLee. I am Dog(s). (2021). I am Dog(s) is a semi-autobiographical narrative about a freshly cracked trans woman struggling with multiple discoveries she makes about herself one right after another.

SoftAnnaLee. The Alyxcule. A transformation story about being assimilated by the Borg, if the Borg was a queer otherkin polycule of cuddle.

Talbot, Bryan. The Tale of One Bad Rat. (1995). An abused teenager runs away from home, accompanied by her pet rat, who later becomes an imaginary friend who stays with her the entire book.

Thorson, Maddy. Celeste. (2018). A video game platformer about a depressed girl who decides to climb a mountain, only to discover that the place brings your mind to life. And the girl's mind really, REALLY doesn't like her.

Trippe, Mayday (under the name Dean Trippe). Something Terrible. (2013). An autobiographical account of dealing with childhood trauma with Batman... and then coming to return the favor.

Trujillo, Olga. The Sum of my Parts: a survivor's tale of dissociative identity disorder. (2011). A lesbian DID memoir, pretty good and not as well known. Has the level of violence and horror your would expect from a DID memoir.

Zyfron. Gemini: The Webcomic About Living Plural. (2010-2013). Slice-of-life strips.

Zyfron. Becoming Median. (2018). A zine about integration, being median, and dealing with trauma.

Have a story to add? Leave it in the comments below.

Comments

[feotakahari]

Probably okay:

Brandon Sanderson talked to “a consultant on Dissociative Identity Disorder” when writing The Stormlight Archive. I haven’t read this one.

I don’t know much of anything about the video game Killer7, except that the main character is multiple and the plot reportedly makes no sense. A lot of people love this game, for what it’s worth.

Grandia II has a choir maiden share a body with a demoness who isn’t nearly as evil as she seems. Very fun, very anti-Christianity even by ‘90s JRPG standards.

The entire race of Eldar in Warhammer 40K are multiple. They’re arguably evil, but so is everyone in 40K.

At some point Artemis Fowl gets a headmate called Orion? I don’t really know anything about this.

Not recommended:

The Tribe of One series by Simon Hawke is D&D fantasy with a multiple protagonist. I got bored partway through the first book because it had these super long descriptive passages that didn’t forward the story.

Today’s Cerberus is a lighthearted romcom manga that portrays cerberi as a race of natural multiples. Not really good, not really bad.

Blindsight by Peter Watts is grimdark as fuck. The point where I dropped it was a multiple being realistically and painfully discriminated.

I won’t recommend Rosario + Vampire because it ends in a merge.

I Will Fear no Evil by Robert Heinlein has a rich man using the seemingly brain-dead body of his former secretary, and then the secretary shows up as a personality too. Arguably sexist, definitely fetishistic. Heinlein gonna Heinlein.

Everything else I can think of has an evil alter. Change 123? Evil alter. United States of Tara? Evil alter. Total Drama Island? How does THIS have an evil alter?

Oh, and there’s a ton of stuff here, a fraction of which doesn’t have an evil alter: https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/SplitPersonality

[stealthsystem]

Not quite multiple in the classic sense, but Skullgirls has at least two people sharing their body with what are called parasites, if I'm remembering my Skullgirls lore properly. One of these is Filia who shares her body with a "parasite" called Samson who saved her life when her family were killed.
I'm having to yoink this out of common memory, and neither our Filia nor Samson are near enough to ask. Bonus for being actually accessible, despite being a mainstream fighting game. The devs found out that someone's screen reader couldn't read their font, so they made the whole thing screen-reader friendly. And later DLC voiced the entire game so you don't have to deal with robot voice breaking your emersion.

[feotakahari]

I thought of something! Black Star Rising by Frederik Pohl is fairly average sci-fi, but the multiple scientist Manyface is treated with surprising respect.

[erinptah]

At least United States of Tara doesn't introduce the "evil alter" until the final season, so you can go "gosh, what a shame it was canceled after season 3, guess we'll never find out what happened next."

Creature of Habit can be added, under the "plural creator says it's about their DID" category? (I almost typo'd that as "plural creature", lol.)

Moon Knight (Marvel) is a DID system, although, comics being comics, the way it's handled varies wildly from one run to the next. IMO the TV series did a good job leaning into the best of "they're different guys with different strengths and weaknesses, healthiness for them means learning to work together and support each other, some of them have a higher capacity for violence/killing but it's all within the genre conventions of superhero stuff, none of them are eeeeevil."

[starfallhaven]

One day we'll finish our book and be able to add it to the list.

[feotakahari]

Looking up Creature of Habit, I’m finding a song and a picture book?

[lb_lee]

You want the big honking picture book! (Seriously, it is like 500 pages, it's big.)

We've read it, but I didn't put it on the list because it's one of those things where the creator was plural, and the book is clearly about trauma and self-defeating behavior, but it's not about PLURALITY, as such. A singlet could read it without that context and miss nothing.

--Sneak

[lb_lee]

I believe in you!

--Sneak

[lb_lee]

I totally forgot about Moon Knight! Our roommates watched the show, and it was too violent for us, but we wandered in and out periodically, and I really enjoyed how they depicted switches and that sense of dislocation! (Also the music was really good, even though that Engelbert Humperdinck song is a total earworm.)

--Sneak

[erinptah]

Oh, glad you liked (the parts you saw of) it! It's my big Fandom Obsession right now, and apparently there's some contention on the internets over how accurate it was, while I'm over here thinking...it seemed fine? It exaggerates and dramatizes some things, obviously, because it's a TV show. And it uses visuals to portray things that wouldn't necessarily be visual IRL, because, again -- TV show. None of it seemed Bad (to my non-expert eye), as long as you cut it a normal amount of slack for those things.

And yeah, the music is beautiful. I keep pulling up the instrumental soundtrack on Youtube when I need some pretty, non-verbal background vibes.

[lb_lee]

Sneak: Yeah, I don't think we could watch it in its entirety, and I'm not sure we'd really ENJOY it in its entirety, but what I saw used the medium of film to depict internal experiences in pretty interesting ways! (Also, it is a superhero show about being badgered by dead gods. So there's a certain amount of guaranteed unrealism!) We are just unfortunately way too jaded about plural media, and thus automatically dissect it according to All The Tropes We've Seen Before, which mostly guarantees we won't enjoy it.

I liked how the different headmates got different suits!

[erinptah]

I think they're live gods, the main one is just skeleton-shaped for the Aesthetic XD

But yes, the basic genre is important!

I like the suits too. (There's one headmate who never gets to transform in this season, so one of the fun fandom exercises is "all right, which of the many costumes from 40+ years of comics continuity do we want to yoink to be his suit?")

[sorcyress]

I love Konigsburg, and especially her kinda-fucked-up "Silent to the Bone" (content warnings for CSA). I will have to check out (george) for sure, thank you for putting it on the list!

~Sor

Thank you!

[ysabetwordsmith]

... for listing Polychrome Heroics.

[lb_lee]

Silent to the Bone is great; I own a copy.

I am giving away my copy of (george) and you live nearby. If you want it, PM me your address and you can have it.

Rogan

[lb_lee]

Sneak: the god isn't even dead???

Mori: that's what we get for wandering in and out at random times.

Sneak: unfortunately, I probably couldn't put the comic on the list unless people named specific volumes, because I know we read at least one book where he wasn't plural (anymore?) and this is supposed to be a list where the plurality is a major load-bearing part of the story.

Rogan: I haven't really been in fandom, but just the random bits I've seen of people shipping the headmates has given me the weird mixed feelings of, "wow, people shipping a relationship type that I've been excoriated for," and "yesssss, that's right, change your own minds, work out your plural hangups on fictional characters and not me, do my job for me with fanfic, ahahahaha."

[lb_lee]

Sneak: If Artemis Fowl got a headmate, it was only after the first four books, which I recall having a dip in quality. If a plural who's read it chimes in with, "it's worth it and here's why," I'll put it in.

Our favorite Let's Player did Killer7! I should watch it, see whether to add it; he's a completionist so I'm not worried about missing anything. Thanks for reminding me of that, Feo!

[lb_lee]

Sneak: oh, very cool! That sounds like a cool addition! Are Filia and Samson main characters? I'm trying to keep the list to things where the plurality is key to the story, to the point that removing it would make the whole thing collapse.

Re: Thank you!

[lb_lee]

Sneak: No problem! I'm trying to focus especially on independent creators you can't easily find with a "subject: multiple personality" search at the library catalog!

[talewisefellowship]

not to toot my own horn but my manga (Hikaru no Go by Hotta Yumi) is a plural story imo. it's even what inspired yan to get in touch with the system!

wasn't sure if I should suggest it but it looks like u got Paprika up there so its probably fine

--Hikaru

[feotakahari]

They’re the closest thing to protagonists, although each character has a “route.”

[silvercat17]

There's a comic series called The Badger by Mike Baron ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Badger_(comics) ). The title character is multiple.

As I recall, it's a mixed bag in regards to plurality (and several other things).

[silvercat17]

Oh, and a manga called Othello ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Othello_(Satomi_Ikezawa_manga) ). It's been a long time since I read it.

(I have scans of both The Badger and Othello if people want to take a look)

[erinptah]

Not dead! He's just a giant bony drama queen.

Heh, if anything can bring "sometimes headmates have relationships with each other and it's fine" to mainstream awareness, it's gotta be "yo dawg I heard u like Oscar Isaac so I put some Oscar Isaac in your Oscar Isaac so you can ship Oscar Isaac with Oscar Isaac" XD



And yeah, the comics are pretty uneven. Every few years a new writing team comes along and tries to completely reinvent the Moon Knight cast. And/or retcon all their developments from the last run, to go back to the status quo from the run before that...

There's a bit of a recurring thing where Marc (the headmate with the wallet name/generally written as the core) will decide "to get my act together and put my mental health in order, I need to get past this DID and be just one guy." In the hands of a bad writer, this is a gimmick that stands for a while, until the next team retcons it. In the hands of a good writer, it's a deliberate case of "Marc is not actually healthier like this, he's falling back on repression and denial, eventually that will get him in trouble and one or both of his headmates will swoop in to help him out of it."

So, okay, some specific volumes where the plurality is a major part of the writing:

"Moon Knight by Lemire & Smallwood: The Complete Collection" (the 2016 run, first half). The classic "villain traps the hero in a fake mental hospital and tries to convince them they only imagined being a superhero" plot. Does a bunch of cool stuff with shifting comic-art styles to convey the characters' dislocation and struggles with unreality. Pulls a "gonna get healthy and not have DID anymore" fakeout; the actual victory they come to is "all the headmates team up to reject an abusive figure's influence in their life."

"Moon Knight: Legacy - The Complete Collection" (the 2016 run, second half). Switches art/writing teams, switches gears completely, now it's mostly "beating up the comics villain of the week" plots. The quality is, uh, infamously VERY variable in these issues...and it would earn a bunch of content warnings for gratuitous Edgy Twists...but "the headmates hanging out/supporting each other/screwing over each other/bickering like a family in a sitcom" is undeniably a major running theme.

Honorable mention for the 1980 run, collected in "Moon Knight Omnibus" volumes 1-2, or "Moon Knight Epic Collection" volumes 1-3. This is MK's first solo title, and the writers haven't fully committed to "this character is a plural system" yet -- but arguably it reads as "a plural system who isn't totally sure what's going on with themselves." The "identities" talk and act differently, express opinions about each other, say things like "no, lady, I'm not the one you're married to"...and struggle with issues like blackouts and depersonalization, which you wouldn't just naturally throw in for a "this guy gets a little too into-character" gimmick. Meanwhile, the loved ones in their lives will make joking-not-joking comments like "say, buddy, you ever read Sibyl? Haha, just kidding...unless??"

[lb_lee]

Sneak: I can't believe he's a skelly JUST BECAUSE. I totally thought he was dead!

Hold those thoughts! I'm working on building a DW comm for the story archive, and I plan to make a user-submissions poll so folks can submit their favorites (and also spare us the brainload of trying to cram-study all the stuff they recommend)!

[lb_lee]

Sneak: Hold that thought, Hikaru! I'm working on making a DW comm with a submissions poll so folks can submit their recs (and thus spare us the brainload of trying to read and check everything).

And I'm trying to use a very broad plural brush! My main requirements are:
* is the plurality, whatever its type, a major load-bearing part of the story, to the point that removing it would break the story? (This is to avoid "okay, there's a side character/only one episode but it's really good, though!")
* is it a story? (no philosophy texts)
* is it worth a plural's time, and why? (Obviously your answer for Hikaru no Go is "YES! Let me tell you!" but I'm trying to avoid the completionist urge to catalog every plural story ever even though nobody actually LIKES it.)

[lb_lee]

Sneak: We've been curious about both! I may take you up on that, Lydean!

Right now, I'm working on putting together a DW comm with a user-submission poll so folks can put their recs in (and spare us the brainload of reading and checking everything)! Hold those thoughts!

[talewisefellowship]

hell yeah sign me the fuck up!!

And yes to all of the above!!!

--Hikaru

[lb_lee]

Sneak: Okay! I created the comm, but I don't want to link it until I have everything set, including my cataloging system! Right now, the set-up idea I have is that I will have two sticky posts: one that is just a summarized list of everything (organized alphabetically by author), and one that is the big poll for folks to submit their recs.

I'll be building a tagging family system to make it easier for people to filter for what they're specifically looking for--be it plural themes (like soulbonding), decade it was made, medium, or genre. I also plan to make the comm searchable, although that would require the searcher have a Dreamwidth account. Still, despite the clunkiness, I feel like that might work out better than trying to create a database or filterable spreadsheet.

I'm still working on how to organize the tags and search terms. Would you or your headmates be interested in helping me kick the tires and test that out when I have that ready? (It'll have to wait until at least tomorrow; today has been the planning and design day.)

[stealthsystem]

Well, this is a fighting game, a la that one Bob loves so much (At least in stories you guys have written) so all the characters are kind of main? But they're the first characters you get to play as.

[talewisefellowship]

sure!!

--Hikaru

Re: Thank you!

[ysabetwordsmith]

I'm happy to see independent creators getting more attention.

However, don't overlook lists and libraries. If you run lots of searches with different related terms, you may get some hits. Also, ask librarians. I've seen many libraries that had archives of topical lists on numerous topics from the common to the obscure. Goodreads is an online example. Finding good books may be harder, but you might at least get some new ideas.

https://www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/multiple-personality-disorder

https://www.paperbackswap.com/Multiple-Personality-Disorder/tag/12419/

https://www.whatshouldireadnext.com/subject/multiple+personality

https://en-academic.com/dic.nsf/enwiki/460609

[zeeth_kyrah]

I don't know if you'd want to list it, but during the events of one book of the Vorkosigan Saga, the character Mark Vorkosigan is tortured and becomes dissociative, eventually manifesting multiple personalities. I don't know if he stays that way or re-integrates, but they do at least form a system and begin to cooperate.

I also don't know if Bujold (the author) is plural, and you've said already you'd prefer to platform plural creators.