Line #14 Creator/MichaelMarshallSmith

Context Creator / MichaelMarshallSmith

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1	[[quoteright:224:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/michael_marshal_smith.jpg]]
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3	Michael Paul Marshall Smith (born 3 May 1965) is a British author of SF and horror.
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5	His debut novel, ''Only Forward'', concerns the search for a missing man through a City divided into numerous eccentric and often dangerous Neighbourhoods; it won the August Derleth Award in Britain and the MediaNotes/PhilipKDickAward in the US. His other novels include ''Spares'', a novel about WalkingTransplant clones which was optioned by Creator/DreamWorksSKG for a while before they made ''Film/TheIsland2005'' instead, and ''One of Us'', in which a man who makes a living renting space in his head for other people's unwanted memories gets stuck with the memory of a murder.
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7	----
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9	!!His works provide examples of:
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11	* BreadEggsMilkSquick: In ''Only Forward'': "On the balcony stood a man. He was a big man, wearing tired jeans and nothing on his feet. His torso was naked except for tiny whorls of hair, and he didn't have a head."
12	* CityInABottle: ''Only Forward'' has a Neighbourhood that long ago sealed itself in and indoctrinated its residents to believe they live in the only surviving human settlement surrounded by a barren, irradiated wasteland (which always takes longer than the scientists thought to become safe again). Only the high-ups know that there's a perfectly viable world all around it. Worryingly, it's not the scariest Neighbourhood out there.
13	* DreamLand: ''Only Forward'' uses Jeamland [sic] as a major plot point/setting. The protagonist is a private eye, specialising in clients whose psyches are being poisoned by the denizens of Jeamland.
14	* EarthAllAlong: In ''Only Forward'', The City was mistaken by the protagonist for a parallel dimension but turns out to be a future Earth. TheConstant here is Nelson's Column.
15	* MurderDotCom: In the short story "More Tomorrow", an abusive boyfriend forces a woman to pose for erotic pictures which he posts online...then the story ends with the next picture being titled "pretty_amputee".
16	* NeuroVault: In ''One of Us'', the main character makes his living storing memories that others want to get rid of temporarily -- for instance, a businessman about to screw over his partner hands over a memory of a moral lesson from his father. (Permanently destroying a memory screws up the Force.) Unfortunately for him, someone figures out that this can work as LaserGuidedAmnesia for the giver, and that the BigBad only wants to kill anyone who ''remembers'' a particular secret.
17	* RunningGag: In ''Only Forward'' nearly every character compliments Stark's shirt.
18	* VerbalTic: In ''Only Forward'', Stark frequently says that he might tell us about things later, if they're relevant.
19	* WalkingTransplant: The premise of ''Spares''.

Context Creator / MichaelMarshallSmith