Astounding Science Fiction, April 1957“Call Me Joe” (novelette)
by Poul Anderson (1926-2001)
Originally published in Astounding Science Fiction, April 1957

From one of Jupiter’s smaller moons, the Solar System’s largest planet is studied by a team of dedicated researchers. One of their project’s primary tools is the pseudojovian, a powerful genetically-engineered creature designed to live in the harsh conditions of Jupiter’s surface, and controlled psionically from the research station with the help of a device called an esprojector. The first of the pseudojovians, “Joe,” is already on the surface, remotely controlled by a bitter quadriplegic named Edward Anglesey. But an important component in the esprojector keeps burning out, which brings specialist Jan Cornelius to the station to investigate and, hopefully, solve the problem. What he discovers will have unexpected effects for Anglesey and Joe, for the research project, and for the future of Jupiter itself.

My Review: Wow.

That was pretty much the sum total of my reaction to this story. This is exactly the kind of story I’ve been hoping to find as I troll the history of science fiction. It ventures into several fields, some real (astronomy, planetology, psychology, physics), some science-fictional (psionics, the genetic engineering used to create the pseudojovians), and some seemingly without meaning to (a primitive civilization aborning in a harsh, demanding climate). Impressively, although this story is fifty-one years old at the time of this writing, the only part of it that seemed dated to me was the way the crew of the research station smoked wherever and whenever they wanted.

The key to this story is the development of the relationships between Anglesey and Joe, and between Joe and his environment. Both relationships are handled really well by Anderson, who does an admirable job of making both his characters and his Jovian surface believable (even if some part of the back of my brain is aware of how, over the last fifty years, what has been learned about Jupiter makes Anderson’s speculations impossible—in a way, that just makes the believability of this story more impressive). Even more importantly, the fun scientific stuff isn’t just presented on a platter of dry exposition, but in a way that truly engaged my imagination and my sense of wonder. When I finished, all I could think of to say has already been said in this review. To wit:

Wow.

Verdict: A well-rounded SF story that was intelligent, and entertaining in a number of different ways. I cannot recommend it highly enough. If you like SF at all, you owe it to yourself to find and read “Call Me Joe.” (It’s in the collections The Science Fiction Hall of Fame, Vol. Two A and Masterpieces: The Best Science Fiction of the Century, and probably any number of others.)