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pluralstories “When you hunt predators, the best camouflage is weakness.”
Blurb: Burke, a merc/PI living on the seamiest side of New York City, gets involved in a case involving an abused nine-year-old multiple who has murdered two of his baby foster brothers. Burke has to negotiate a truce between the cops and child welfare groups coming to blows over him... and also get revenge for the multiple's sake.
Why is it worth your time?: It's a pretty good grim-n-gritty crime novel. However, it's probably the only of its like that will be in this catalog, and it comes with caveats. It is very, very much a book from 1991: the memory wars, ritual abuse, and Satanic trappings of group child abuse are all plot points, and the multiple has a murderer headmate. However, and the reason this book is in the catalog, is that it's the only one I've seen that takes a murderer multiple and treats them with sympathy and compassion--it takes the tack not of "multiples don't murder people" but "even if a multiple does murder someone, they still deserve compassion and care." Chosen family and the welfare of children, even "bad" children, are core themes. This is definitely not a book for everybody, but it is a book for SOMEBODY. (Also, it's nice to see someone discuss ritual abuse with the air of, "yeah, the trappings are to scare the victims; Satanism is not itself the problem.")
Plural Tags: MPD, fusion, switching, abuse high-focus
Content Warnings: include spoilers; see comments
Accessibility Notes: Available on paper, ebook, and audiobook.
Blurb: Burke, a merc/PI living on the seamiest side of New York City, gets involved in a case involving an abused nine-year-old multiple who has murdered two of his baby foster brothers. Burke has to negotiate a truce between the cops and child welfare groups coming to blows over him... and also get revenge for the multiple's sake.
Why is it worth your time?: It's a pretty good grim-n-gritty crime novel. However, it's probably the only of its like that will be in this catalog, and it comes with caveats. It is very, very much a book from 1991: the memory wars, ritual abuse, and Satanic trappings of group child abuse are all plot points, and the multiple has a murderer headmate. However, and the reason this book is in the catalog, is that it's the only one I've seen that takes a murderer multiple and treats them with sympathy and compassion--it takes the tack not of "multiples don't murder people" but "even if a multiple does murder someone, they still deserve compassion and care." Chosen family and the welfare of children, even "bad" children, are core themes. This is definitely not a book for everybody, but it is a book for SOMEBODY. (Also, it's nice to see someone discuss ritual abuse with the air of, "yeah, the trappings are to scare the victims; Satanism is not itself the problem.")
Plural Tags: MPD, fusion, switching, abuse high-focus
Content Warnings: include spoilers; see comments
Accessibility Notes: Available on paper, ebook, and audiobook.
Content Warnings
Date: 2022-08-07 10:43 pm (UTC)The multiple's treatment is super rushed and barrels towards fusion, which is their major goal. (Considering they're trying to put the kid together enough to go to trial and also not murder anyone else, you might argue that the plot somewhat justifies it.)
Oh, and also this is the kind of book that uses words like "Oriental" and has a voodoo queen character, so you know.