Jupiter

One of the great enterprises of modern science has been our discovery, largely through unmanned probes, of the real solar system of which our Earth is a part. The old solar system of our imagination was exotic enough. But the new, real one turns out to be even stranger . . . .Beginning with Venus, Ben Bova set out to write a new series of loosely-linked SF novels dramatizing for a wide readership the real solar system we live in. In Venus, we were taken first-hand to the crushing, searing surface of that truly terrifying planet. Now, in Jupiter, Bova takes us to one of the strangest places imaginable, a place where hydrogen flows as a liquid, a place with a lightless ocean ten times wider than the entire Earth, a place where cyclones larger than planets rage for centuries at a time.

Grant Archer merely wanted to study astrophysics, to work quietly as an astronomer on the far side of the Moon. But the forces of the “New Morality”, the coalition of censoriuous do-gooders who run 21st century America, have other plans for him. To his distress, Grant is torn from his young bride and sent to a research station in orbit around Jupiter, charged with the task of spying on the scientists who work there. What they don’t know is that his loyalty to science may be greater than his loyalty to the “New Morality”. But that loyalty will be tested in a mission as dangerous as any ever undertaken . . .