The Spare Man

Hugo and Nebula Award-winner Mary Robinette Kowal blends her no-nonsense, hard-SF approach to life in space with her talent for creating glittering high society in this stylish SF mystery.

Tesla Crane, a brilliant inventor and an heiress, is on her honeymoon via an interplanetary space liner. Cruising between the Moon and Mars, she’s traveling incognito and reveling in her anonymity. Then someone is murdered and the festering chowderheads who run security have the audacity to arrest her spouse. Armed with banter, martinis and her small service dog, Tesla is determined to solve the crime so that the newlyweds can get back to canoodling— And keep the real killer from striking again.

The Spare Man is nothing short of The Thin Man in space, but is a piece that Kowal has made her own and will be a hit with her audience.

About the Author

Mary Robinette Kowal is the author of the Hugo, Nebula, and Locus Award-winning alternate history novel, The Calculating Stars, the first book in the Lady Astronaut series, which continues with The Martian Contingency. She is also the author of The Glamourist Histories series and Ghost Talkers and has received the Astounding Award for Best New Writer, four Hugo Awards, the Nebula, and Locus Awards. Her stories appear in Asimov’s, Uncanny, and several Year’s Best anthologies. Mary Robinette has also worked as a professional puppeteer, is a member of the Award-winning podcast Writing Excuses, and performs as a voice actor (SAG/AFTRA), recording fiction for authors including Seanan McGuire, Cory Doctorow, and Neal Stephenson. She lives in Tennessee with her husband Rob and over a dozen manual typewriters.