Set This House In Order

[arhuaine.livejournal.com]

I heard on a mailing list about a novel called "Set This House In Order" on the subject of Multiplicity, and after reading the first four chapters on the Matt Ruff website I couldn't NOT buy it. I'm almost halfway through already. It's very good so far; Ruff seems to have as much disdain for the psychiatric model of multiplicity as we do. And there's lots in it that we relate to very strongly; mostly with the character of Andrew Gage(the organised, co-conscious system) but also in part with Penny Driver (the unaware, disordered system). I may write more about these things when we've finished the book. Ruff references Astraea's Web as his online reference for multiplicity, which has to be a good thing. I think he must at least have talked extensively with some real multiples to write this book.

Anyone else read it? Thoughts?

Comments

[toride.livejournal.com]

it amazes us how we can relate to the book.. oO;;
have to buy .. ^^; definitely.. ^^;;

- Oz

[zaecus.livejournal.com]

And a mainstream publisher, too. Cool!

I've got an idea of my own written down for a book involving a non-psychiatric-model multiple, but mine has a different premise at this early stage. I have another book to finish first anyway.

I'll have to look into getting this one. Hopefully it stays good (in more ways than one all the way through, and if so, I hope it gets a lot of attention. :-)

[ksol1460.livejournal.com]

Well, he never talked to us. At all.

He seems to have used our website as a cafeteria, picking and choosing those ideas that would fit with his idea of what multiplicity was, and rejecting those that seemed not to be commercially viable. Note his premise that even for a functioning, well-ordered multiple group, a therapist is necessary to facilitate the operating system. Note in addition his concept that choice of who should maintain and control such an operating system is based on "dominance", indicating that "dominance" equals the ability to tolerate physical trauma, i.e., being able to slam a kitchen knife through your own hand. That's pure Cameron West, and totally uncalled for.

Furthermore, he cites our acceptance of the idea that some multiple systems experience some of their members as spirits of the dead (on our FAQ), and implies that this invalidates our entire premise.

If you want to read two reviews of Set This House in Order, they are at:

http://www.tanuki.cx/pavilion/library/articles/m_review_setamo0503.html

and

http://www.tanuki.cx/pavilion/library/articles/m_review_set0503.html

Ekristheh Akanora
Anthony Temple

[toride.livejournal.com]

*reads the reviews*

I see.
the 'dominance' aspect intrigues me though, this system also centers around 'the dominant one' -- and we're considering to change that.. not sure for the better/worse, since it worked for us.

and this book.. does it firmly pro-dominance/ contra-dominance in the end?
would like to stay as non-biased as possible, really. and being a fiction, whatever effect it would cause to us/the decision.. definitely couldn't be accounted for.

thank you.

- S

[arhuaine.livejournal.com]

I've nearly finished it and yes it is firmly pro-dominance. I'm not fond of this approach - I prefer a democracy, but it's not exactly working that way for us at the moment. But yes, this is one of my biggest gripes about the book; it implies that the dominance approach is *essential* for a functional household, that the only way to stay functional is to keep all other insiders in submission.

[shandra.livejournal.com]

That's what fiction writers do. Pick & choose. :)

It's not the responsibility of Matt Ruff (who's a great up & coming writer btw; I was impressed with Fool on the Hill - haven't read this one yet as it's still on my hold list at the library) to present a balanced viewpoint. It's more up to multiples to express their own in how it's similar and how it differs.

Shandra

[cheshire-house.livejournal.com]

I'm rather disappointed that a writer, who should be familiar with copyright civilities, would willingly and freely rip data from a source without regard. I do hope your website is cited properly...otherwise that would be Very Not Nice...
...it would bode ill for that writer.

~Cheshire House.

[shandra.livejournal.com]

Good lord. Fiction writers don't cite. They use material to create /their/ worlds and their characters' attitudes. They definitely "rip data" - it's called research and world building. It is not, unlike an academic work, a process where they engage in critical discussion. Instead a fiction author goes out, researches the world /his characters/ live in (making /choices/) and then allows that to percolate down to a coherent framework. It's called writing.

Have you checked the footnotes for fiction books lately? :-) You will note it mostly highly absent.

If they quote whole works directly (like a song) generally they do have to obtain rights to it. But if they use ideas, or have their characters read small sections of a larger work, or be influenced by actual ideas and philosophies it is free and clear. I think, personally, it's an asset to the community that he did do some research but he had no obligation to the multiple community. He writes fiction because he wants to present his worlds and characters, not someone else's.

Jesus Christ, just because this author "dared" to write about multiples - as main characters, I might add, pretty sane ones from all accounts - does not make him fucking accountable for everyone's views. He wrote a /novel/.

Shandra

[sethrenn.livejournal.com]

Now hold on a minute. There's no need to be upset here-- you seem to be reading an awful lot into a very brief statement. No one (that I can see) is suggesting that fiction authors put footnotes into their books every time they've done research for something. What it is about is not legal issues, but courtesy. Even Stephen King, as much of a hack as I consider him to be for the most part, put an acknowledgement in one of his books about where he got his information on government-funded psi research. Singlets writing about multiples is no different than straight people writing about gay people, or Christians writing about Buddhists, or white people writing about blacks or Indians. You're talking about a way of life very different from yours, about which you are likely to already hold some unconscious inground stereotypes imparted from the media, and you need to educate yourself from the accounts of people who have lived that life. There are firsthand sources and there are secondhand sources. Talking to a singlet therapist who works with multiples, no matter how thorough an understanding they claim to have of it, is a secondhand source. Talking to someone who's LIVED multiplicity is a firsthand source. If you had to do a greater-than-usual amount of research in order to get information on a group of people, it is -polite- to credit those people-- it seems almost, well, aversive to me, that you wouldn't dare admit you had gaps in your knowledge, that you actually had to stoop to getting info from those evil perverts, those ungodly pagans, or those primitive savages, admitting they know more about their way of life than you do. Or those crazies.

I would not be so ticked off about the issue of courtesy in this book if not for the fact that he has the audacity to trash Astraea on his website for daring to mention that some multiples experienced in-system residents as being spirits from outside the body, making it sound like he was skeptical of the entire thing at best. In reality, where do you think he got the word "household" for a multiple system from? I don't know of many other systems who use that. And who has the biggest page on empowered multiplicity online? He never even e-mailed them until the book had gone to press, and then it was only to ask if they would sell it through his books page. He never talked to them personally (if he had, I might add, it would have cleared up his misunderstanding about the spirits business). So yes, I do consider that rude. He could have just said "Astraea" or one of the specific names of their system members in his acknowledgements, instead of lumping them all in with the therapists and DID patients he got the rest of his info from. It isn't about whether the book was good or bad, or about just how much authors should give credit for in generall, it is that I consider him to have breached etiquette to have taken so much from Astraea's page and then trashed them on his own page, almost as if he was trying to cover up his own trail.


Gemma (formerly Tamsin)

[shandra.livejournal.com]

Well, one of the interesting things is always how people perceive works of fiction and tie them into their own experience.

Matt Ruff's own essay on Powells.com (http://www.powells.com/fromtheauthor/ruff.html) says that his major inspiration were two actual real live multiples, one of whom had a house. I don't see any reason not to take him at his word; presumably he knows what his major influences were.

I think that it is a mistake to presume that Astraea's Web is the be-all and end-all of empowered multiplicity; while I think it is a great site in that it presents ideas straight from the multiples' mouths, so to speak, it's certainly not where I first came across the idea. It may be one of the primary sources of natural multiplicity but I'm not sure Ruff entirely buys that idea.

There are also much more academic and critical resources which raise similar questions about the definition of personhood, notably Elyn Jacks' Jekyll on Trial and Jennifer Radden's Divided Minds and Successive Selves. The second's too new to have influenced Ruff specifically.

As for the "trashing" I don't see that it is; Ruff's comments are reasonable and stated as opinion. But I appreciate that you might consider it rude; it's not an uncommon reaction from readers close to a subject that's handled in fiction. Fact is, Ruff is welcome to his ideas too, and courtsey does not include agreeing with everything someone's put on a website. I presume that if Astraea had something to say in fiction, they'd write it down and get it published. :)

[sethrenn.livejournal.com]

FWIW, I guess I just don't feel basing it off -two- people is enough. I find the apparent immediate assumption that the house in which all of them lived was "imaginary" to be somewhat offensive, also.

As for trashing Astraea, I admit I haven't been back to his website in awhile, but I clearly remember at one point that it said something along the lines of while Astraea's standpoint that abuse wasn't always the cause of multiplicity was an "interesting theory," it was "weakened" by their idea that spirits from outside the body could be part of a system. Come on-- just because they have one idea he doesn't agree with it invalidates the rest of it? That's my real problem. Not that he's not entitled to disagree-- we personally have seen people in systems claiming to be walk-ins who we were dubious of at best-- but does their believing that, or even just accepting at face value people who say system members are spirits, give proof that they're so loony that nothing else they say can be trusted? That's really my problem with it, to be honest.

As for Astraea&'s writing, well, actually, they're working on that :) They've had a lot of setbacks with their creative work, I'm obviously not going to give all the details of our conversations here, but there definitely is a possibility there. Hmmm...


Gemma

[ksol1460.livejournal.com]

As I understand it, he used the concepts presented on our pages. And as you may have seen, the articles we write ourselves have no copyright and we encourage people to use our ideas freely. He's perfectly welcome to those. Many fiction authors whose work has required a modicum of research have an acknowledgements page at the front or back of the book; we don't know that he has or does not have one. This is an option, a matter of courtesy; he doesn't have to include it. Nor does he have to include us in the acknowledgements, even if he read every word of every page on the website; he may simply have regarded our concepts as too extreme to be believed; after all he wants the book to sell. (I'm basing this on what other fiction authors, who have written to us, have stated at the end of a sometimes exhaustive correspondence.)

We would have liked it better if he'd presented the idea that therapy is not necessary to creating a functional operating system, or that multiplicity is not necessarily a matter of abuse; but again, he's got to sell the thing. He has to consider, not only what he wants to say, but what people want to see.

[cheshire-house.livejournal.com]

wow...didn't realize one of the burners posted. Hopefully they'll stick to the personal journal...didn't mean to incite such a spark, ya'll. He just finished getting a head full of college literature class plagurism stuffits and i guess it set him off.
I was going to say something further, but forgot. Mew. *drags the burner off to paint or somethin'* :)

~Cheshire House (it's the name on the door...we all use it.)

[ksol1460.livejournal.com]

There was nothing wrong with what he said. He just misunderstood the way things work in publishing. Intellectual property law is a big pain in the neck anyway. http://www.negativland.com if he's interested in finding out more about it. We also have a few links up at http://www.astraeasweb.net/politics/freespeech.html (scroll down a bit).

[myorp.livejournal.com]

On initial perusal it seems to us that this is indeed very good fiction. Indeed it seems to be well researched but I think that, as fiction, it can be given certain leeways in its interpretations of multiplicity. It is after all merely the author's vision and artistic attempt to describe such a system.

It is indeed also important that such a book be accurate, but given the relative and variable nature of multiplicity as a subject it seems to me that any issues that the author has are, as one must expect, merely opinions and need not be taken as threatening.

I do indeed think that I would be interested in reading more of this book if I can manage to get a copy of it soon. First though I do believe I should read up on the primary reference material which, I must admit, I've neglected to investigate in any way despite our connections and interactions with its administrator.

Until then.
~Malmenel

[myorp.livejournal.com]

you say indeed too much XD

and it sounds like a good read to me too ^_^

[thenetwork.livejournal.com]

::Add book to Xmas list::

[perse.livejournal.com]

I found it by chance in the New Fiction section of the library a couple months ago.

I had finished it within a couple days and about halfway into it I went to Amazon and sent it to my partner.

I can't speak to which theories he's espousing that I agree with or don't agree with, but there was a lot in both Andy and Penny that I identified with and my partner (who I'm pretty open with) found it to be very helpful in that she's known about the running commentary but not had much of a sense of how it plays out RT.

For my system at least, the front is dominant AND we're a democracy. But then the system is big on situational ethics too. lol.

Take all of this with a grain of salt, I don't choose to be an "educated" multiple, I don't read any of the traditional (fiction) literature, don't espouse any particular psychological viewpoint - think everyone should do what works for them, just happened across this novel by chance.

I was quite impressed from a literary standpoint and from an inside-the-head standpoint.

smiles
Gira

[36.livejournal.com]

Got me a free review copy shipped from America months ago, which was nice.

Liked it but was very insulted by the 'twist' in the middle and non-plussed by the dominance stuff. This said, I'll still compulsively read anything that represents any degree of functional plurality.

oh

[kaleidescope.livejournal.com]

i think we read you talking about that somewhere. where might it have been? on livejournal? hmm.

this makes some of us want to post links to our national novel-writing month books, which are both about multiples, and get feedback. but i'm not sure if that's a good idea yet :)

[iamshadow.livejournal.com]

*wanders off to check it out on amazon...*

btw, arhuaine, your icon is so cool....very perty...

us