Joe Steele

Joe Steele is an alternate history novel by Harry Turtledove, first published by Roc Books/New American Library in hardcover and ebook form in April 2015. It is an expanded version of the author's 2003 short story of the same name.The original concept comes from a line in Janis Ian's song "God and the FBI" which says "Stalin was a Democrat." In the foreword, Turtledove explains that from hearing this song, he began to imagine reasons for Stalin to be a Democrat, and the story grew from there. Janis Ian was an editor of the original short story, and is the dedicatee of the resulting novel.