Nerves (Del Rey novella)

Nerves

Author	Lester del Rey
Language	English
Genre	Science fiction novel Techno-thriller
Publisher	Street & Smith Publications, Inc: Astounding Science Fiction
Publication date	Sept 1942 (Expanded 1956, revised 1976)
Publication place	United States
Media type	Periodical (Later paperback)
Pages	74 (1942 version); 153 (1956); 192 (1976)

Nerves is a novella from science fiction's "Golden Age" written by American author Lester del Rey (1915–1993). It was first published in Astounding Science Fiction magazine by John W. Campbell, Jr in September 1942, with illustrations by William Timmins.

The novella was well received and has been anthologized countless times. Del Rey expanded the work and updated the science in the story in 1956 when it was published as a stand-alone novel. He revised it again in 1976 as a final version.

The techno-thriller involves a near-future "atomic products" plant (changed to a nuclear power plant in the later versions) where, after an industrial accident, a plant physician and his team race against time to prevent a continent-wide catastrophe. It was published ten months after the United States' entry into World War II and three months after the Battle of Midway, but about three years before the first use of an atomic weapon at Hiroshima. Del Rey's expansion/revision of 1956 came out shortly after the world's first nuclear power plants became operational.

Synopsis

At the National Atomic Products Co., Inc., located in the American Midwest some years after end of the "Great War" (World War II), Doctor "Doc" Roger Ferrel, the "physician in charge", leads a mixed team of occupational physicians, atomic physicists, nurses, medical attendants, and others. Among his colleagues and subordinates are Doctor Matsuura "Hoke" Hokusai (a top Japanese atomic physicist who had been distraught "over the treachery of his people"), Doctor Robert "Bob" Jenkins (an unseasoned physician with a degree in "atomics" and additional, carefully hidden expertise), Doctor Sue Brown Jenkins (Bob's wife, among the first of a new breed of "nursing doctor") and expert atomist Jorgenson (who has the most knowledge about the plant's process, but is unfortunately incapacitated early in the story). The plant's atomic products are not electric power or nuclear weapons, but radioactive pesticides to combat boll weevils and other agricultural applications. Among these is a radioactive isotope known as Natomic I-713, which is useful due to its very short half-life. It degrades into the less benign Isotope R, and sometimes Mahler's Isotope, which is existentially threatening. An accidental explosion occurs at one of the plant's four "converters" ("reactors" in the 1956 revision), and Ferrel and his teammates work frantically at the plant infirmary in an ongoing mass casualty operation. The drug curare is utilized to abate the seizures attendant upon radiation sickness. Hypothermia is also used to facilitate major surgery, and an early speculative version of a heart-lung machine is used, as well. Ferrel's team's contributions are ultimately crucial in averting nation-wide catastrophe.

Reception

The significance of "Nerves" was recognized early on when it was anthologized in "the definitive collection of Golden Age science fiction" (according to Robert Silverberg) -- namely, Adventures in Time and Space (1946), a book still in print.

"Nerves" was selected in 1973 by the Science Fiction Writers of America for inclusion in The Science Fiction Hall of Fame (Vol. IIA), which signals the most important works published prior to the SFWA's founding in 1965.

Revisions

Del Rey updated "Nerves" in 1956 with an expanded version published by Ballantine Books. In this version, the action transpires at a nuclear power plant in Kimberly, Missouri. Atomic weapons are not mentioned in the 1942 version of the story, except for a brief statement on Hokusai's enthusiasm for research into "an atomic explosive bomb which will let us wipe out the rest of the world". Del Rey again revised the work in 1976 and provided an afterword.