The Clone
clone, n. ... Biol. The aggregate of individual organisms descended by asexual reproduction from a single sexually produced individual; ...—Webster's New International Dictionary, Second Ed.[1]
The Clone: A Science Fiction Novel was a 1965 science fiction/horror novel written by Theodore L. Thomas and Kate Wilhelm. It is based on an earlier short story of Thomas' by the same name. The year it was published, it was nominated for a Nebula Award, but lost to Frank Herbert's Dune.
A monstrous entity is accidentally created when four different ingredients - muriatric acid, trisodium phosphate, silica gel and hamburger meat - combine in a Chicago sewer catch basin. It starts as a microscopic organism but swiftly grows into a huge green blob which Thomas and Wilhelm insist on calling a "clone."
The "clone" quickly begins spreading through the sewers and aqueducts beneath Chicago, soon flowing up into people's homes through their drains. It absorbs living and nonliving matter on contact, converting everything into more of its own tissue. At first only a minor threat, it soon grows so huge it threatens the entire city and drastic measures must be taken to stop it from getting into Lake Michigan and spreading further.
The novel is interesting for its borderline omniscient narrative style and lack of a true main character. Instead, the story, when it isn't describing the "clone" attacking and absorbing various people and things in a detached, almost documentary writing style, follows multiple characters and subplots, all with different conclusions (and some with none).
- Anyone Can Die: Half the crowded cast ends up dying.
- Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever
- Blob Monster
- Bus Full of Innocents: The clone converts a whole subway train's worth of commuters.
- Cassandra Truth: Mark Kenniston, when attempting to convince the cops that an absorbing amorphous blob is behind the disappearances.
- Child-Hater: Miss Shea. She hates kids so much one wonders if she became a teacher just to make them suffer.
- Da Chief: The fire chief.
- Do Not Adjust Your Set: A heroic example. Mark and Ian Sorensen force their way into the television studio at gunpoint to hijack the news and warn people about the clone.
- Domestic Abuse: Timothy O'Herlihy smacks his girlfriend around for asking a question. Guess what happens to him. He dies.
- Driven to Suicide: Twice. One man flings himself into the clone after losing his entire family to it. Ellie Hagen is involved with a married man and feels guilty over it, and allows the clone to consume her because she sees it as an "out."
- Empty Piles of Clothing: What is left behind after the clone gets through absorbing someone since it only eats some types of fabric.
- Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep": The fire chief, despite a sizable supporting role, is only ever called "fire chief."
- Extreme Omnivore: The clone eats nonliving matter as well, such as concrete and different types of fabric (except cotton for some reason) and eventually adapts to eating car tires and parts of buildings.
- Gas Leak Coverup: Parodied. Mayor Slattery attributes the disappearances and sightings early on to killer snakes from the sewers. Quashed by Mark and Sorensen (see Do Not Adjust Your Set above) and by the clone making itself more public not long after.
- Green Aesop: The authors believe we really ought to be more careful about what we pour down our drains.
- Heroic Sacrifice: Dory Bernheim, a mechanic who tries to save several schoolchildren from the clone. Especially noble is him trying to comfort a frightened boy as they're being absorbed together.
- Infant Immortality: Averted. Many of the clone's victims are children.
- Insistent Terminology: Authors Thomas and Wilhelm's constant use of "clone" to describe the monster, despite this not exactly being the right word for it.
- The Korean War: Commercial airline pilot Pete Laurenz is a veteran of it.
- Laser-Guided Karma: Timothy O'Herlihy is a domestic abuser who beats up his girlfriend. He's clone fodder.
- Life or Limb Decision: Played straight with Dr. Agnew, who survives. Subverted with an intern who gets absorbed from the inside-out after the clone gets sneaky and goes under the skin of his arm.
- Loads and Loads of Characters
- Mean Boss: Mark's supervisor Dr. Agnew berates and insults him.
- Obstructive Bureaucrat: Mayor Slattery.
- Our Blob Monsters Are Different: The clone does not digest or absorb its victims so much as directly convert them into more of itself on a cellular level. Although, in stark contrast to most Blob Monster stories, the process is completely painless.
- Reasonable Authority Figure: Ian Sorensen.
- Science Marches On: Thomas and Wilhelm's definition of "clone" is a little vague and uses an older if technically correct meaning, quoted above. The creature was sort of "cloned" from dead hamburger meat, and does sort of "clone" itself by turning its victims into more of its own tissue, however this is far and away from the more popular concept wherein a clone is understood to be just an exact duplicate of an individual.
- Security Blanket: Harry's meat cleaver. He never puts it down after the diner massacre.
- Scenery Porn
- Shown Their Work: Thomas and Wilhelm's description of the thing's creation goes a long way towards making it at least seem scientifically plausible. Also their knowledge of the inner workings of Chicago's infrastructure is staggering.
- Sinister Subway: The clone attacks two subway trains and converts everyone in them. Later, after the subway has flooded, Mark and the fire department's rescue team divers battle the clone down there underwater.
- Slept Through the Apocalypse: Timothy O'Herlihy and his girlfriend Patricia had their radio turned off while they were at her place, missing most of the news broadcasts about the clone. Doubles as Late to the Party.
- Too Dumb to Live: Many, but Charles Hallingford, a shopper at Steinway's, takes the cake. After going through all the trouble of very, very carefully getting a sample of clone tissue small enough to handle safely with his bare hands, he winds up absorbed by the main mass attempting to save a suit he was thinking about buying.
- The Windy City: Chicago is never actually identified, but several landmarks, street names, etc. and the city's proximity to Lake Michigan give it away.
- ↑ So says the forward of this book, anyway.