There is a new novel out, Assumed Identity, by David Morrell, where, as a covert agent, the protagonist's skill for assuming identities and aliases becomes an obsessive/compulsive pathology. I'm wondering if there's a word for this pathological condition. Here's a publisher's synopsis of the book:
The protagonist is Brendan Buchanan. He also goes by other names - Potter, Crawford, Block, Davis - in fact, over two hundred others. A member of a special-operations so covert it may as well be run by ghosts, Buchanan is a master of impersonation, a specialist in assuming false identities. But now his unique gifts - and desperate pathology - threaten to destroy him. The beginning of his nightmare occurs in Cancun, Mexico, where Buchanan's latest alias is brutally unmasked. Racing through a torturous escape route, he is shocked to discover that his controllers will no longer give him a new identity. For the first time in eight years, he will have to be himself. But after spending so much time assuming different identities, he no longer knows who he is. Suddenly, he receives a mysterious postcard, a coded, unmistakable plea for help. Its source is Juana Mendez, a former partner who had posed as his wife six years earlier, countless missions ago. In his quest for Juana, Buchanan is thrust into a stark wilderness of mirrors and faced with a harrowing conspiracy. Yet he finds the unreadable maze of his own mind as dangerous as the harsh, chilling world that assails him from without. His partner in the search is Holly McCoy, a reporter whose beauty is matched only by her determination to penetrate Buchanan's multilayered psychological armor and write her subject's real story. Seeking one woman, while inexorably drawn to another, Buchanan relentlessly follows a seductive but deadly trail from Key West to New Orleans, from San Antonio to Mexico City. Ultimately, he will find the truth about Juana, and even the truth about himself - if he can survive.
(So, does anyone know of a term for this condition?)
The Only WO'N!
