Spares [Mass Market Paperback]

Michael Marshall Smith (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 2, 1998

They were raised for one chilling purpose....

A loner, an ex-cop, Jack Randall is the dangerous veteran of a savage war. All he's held dear has long been destroyed. For the last five years, he's been hiding out on a Spares Farm, guarding those who've been prisoners from birth. Now he's on the run with seven of the Farm's inmates (well, six and a half), and the people who own them will do anything to get them back. What's worse, Jack is on a head-on collision course with a cold-blooded killer with one purpose: to cancel Jack once and for all. Jack has a tough decision to make: keep running or even the score. Either way spells trouble...the kind of trouble most people run screaming from.

Who are the Spares? And what is their purpose? That is the most shocking revelation of all.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Imagine a future--next year, perhaps?--in which the wealthy clone themselves at birth to provide spare parts for their bodies as they become needed. Drop into that scenario a tough but compassionate ex-cop who decides to liberate seven "spares" from the farm where they're being kept until needed, and you've got a lively, very moving combination of genres that has already been bought for the big screen. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Publishers Weekly

Coma meets Blade Runner in this future noir thriller, a compulsively readable melding of hardboiled narrative and hardware invention. Smith forecasts a decadent future in which the rich clone themselves at birth and callously harvest replacement organs from their "spares" as they need them. Narrator Jack Randall, a debauched but conscientious ex-cop, flees to the megalopolis of New Richmond with seven clones he has liberated from a spare farm and is almost immediately relieved of them by a gang of thugs. Jack's efforts to find out who has abducted the spares and marked them for death plunge him into a mystery that ultimately links the two events that have shattered his life: the brutal unsolved murder of his wife and child, and his soul-searing tour of military duty in The Gap. A virtual world built from the flotsam and jetsam cluttering the Internet, The Gap is an awesome conception made to seem supernaturally eerie yet scientifically feasible. Smith elaborates this creation brilliantly, as a surreal battleground where Jack confronts the demons that have haunted him for a decade, and as a symbol of emptiness and waste that brings the novel's numerous depictions of personal and social devaluation into sharp focus. Both a disconcerting portrait of a future that might be, and a poignant study of one man's fight to resist it, this novel augurs a promising future of another sort for its author. Film rights to Dreamworks SKG. (May) FYI: This novel is an expansion of Smith's horror short story "To Receive Is Better."
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 384 pages
• Publisher: Bantam (February 2, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0553579010
• ISBN-13: 978-0553579017
• Product Dimensions: 6.8 x 4.2 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.5 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (43 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #161,512 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Novelist, short story writer and screenwriter, writing under the names Michael Marshall Smith and Michael Marshall. As the former, winner of the International Horror Guild and Philip K Dick Award - in addition to winning the British Fantasy Award for best short story more than any other author in history. As Michael Marshall, an internationally-bestselling writer of thrillers.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An involving mix of noir and science fiction., March 30, 1998

By 

Craig Larson (Maple Grove, MN USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Spares (Mass Market Paperback)

Michael Marshall Smith is a great new writer with a very unique and invividual voice. Coming on the heels of his debut, _Only Forward_, _Spares_ confirms that he is definitely someone to watch!

Some reviewers have faulted Smith for attempting to shoehorn too many diverse ideas into a single book, or for creating such an unlikeable person in his protagonist, Jack Randall. Depending on your point of view, this may be a valid criticism. For me, the mix worked and worked in a magical way I come across all too infrequently in my reading these days.

Jack is a drug-addicted former policeman in the surreal future world of New Richmond, Virginia, a grounded MegaMall which has been taken over as the basis for a city. On the run with a group of spares he's liberated from a Farm, Jack comes up against the same forces which necessitated his escape five years previously. Throw in the Gap, a strange, interdimensional reality, not quite analagous to cyberspace but similar, in which a war was fought 20 years ago, a war Jack and several of the other characters are veterans of, and the book is almost overflowing with ideas, originality, and an amazing level of energy.

If you're a fan of cross-genre mixes, hardboiled/sci-fi, this book is definitely worth your while. Based on his first two novels and a number of his short stories, including "More Tomorrow," an excellent Internet horror tale, Smith has quite a future ahead of him and, for now, a dedicated new fan in this critic.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars excellent book. more and more relevant, January 16, 2002

By A Customer

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Spares (Mass Market Paperback)

This book is amazing, really. The hero is sort of an anti-hero. By all normal standards, I should despise him, but he has some hidden inner qualities that far outweigh his vices.
The subject, which centers on cloning, is becoming almost too real for comfort (especially after reading this book!). The reasons for cloning in the book are horrifying, but not at all unrealistic.
Read it. Be disturbed. Watch the news.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Spares, September 30, 2000

By 

"petehybertsen" (USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Spares (Mass Market Paperback)

Spares is not something massively profound and life-changing but it is a great book just the same. Spares manages to mold tragedy, comedy, and some awesome sci-fi into one great story. The comedy aspect will have you laughing hysterically at times and the first time one reads this book it distracts from the other elements. The second time through it becomes apparent that the comedy is really just Jack's way of masking his despair and depression. This is the tale of a desperate man who is in the process of having everything and everyone that he cares about taken away from him. Spares is a complete book in every sense of the word. I would highly recommend that you read it. Now where is the movie thats supposedly in the works?