There's a reason Barbara Hambly wrote so many books. As utterly stupid as the cover of this book looks, and as much as it lays bare some of the neocolonialist ideals of the Federation, it actually features some psychological realism and some genuinely character-driven choices. I really enjoyed the fact that it also takes the Midgwins' culture seriously—that's not something that every Star Trek novel succeeds at.

I love Original Star Trek, and I've been very impressed with Barbara Hambly's work. So this, an Original Series novel by Barbara Hambly had the potential to be an outstanding reading experience.

It failed.

It was terrible. The writing was pretty good, but not nearly good enough to carry the lame plot, and the missed characterization. I slogged through about 60 pages, then gave up. I was pretty sure I knew the entire rest of the story, but I just couldn't face having to read the rest. So I read the very end, and flipped through and read a couple bits at random of the rest. I was right about the plot, and the voices of the cannon characters never got any better.

Even the original characters were pretty bad. Helen (which is a terrible name for the beautiful female lead - far too trite) tried to have a clear, strong voice, but it was a voice that didn't fit into the Star Trek paradigm.

I think, really, that Ms. Hambly just wasn't a good match to write a Star Trek novel. She's a great writer, but her style didn't mesh well with Star Trek. It's entirely possible that a non-Trekkie Hambly fan would enjoy this novel. I'm just glad I only paid $0.20 for it. ( )

A Star Trek ghost story! Hambly is an excellent writer and has a knack for taking an old plot device and twisting it around into something new. The overall pace of the novel is slow, as the author carefully eases the characters to a point where they can accept the reality of a "ghost" despite lack of scientific evidence. Though this occasionally causes the plot to drag, Hambly saves it by drawing us into the wonderfully creepy atmosphere she creates. The plot doesn't need to contain a lot of action when the reader is waiting with hackles raised for something to happen with a bang at any moment. A refreshing change from the action/adventure plot of most Star Trek novels. I might have given it four stars if Hambly's other TOS novels weren't even better. ( )

An interesting and well-plotted Star Trek story about a primitive magic-man's attempt to stop the Enterprise from bringing his people into the Federation by sending his spirit into Kirk's body, displacing Kirk's spirit to eventually die in the bowels of the Enterprise. This author wrote my favorite ST novel, " Ishmael", and this one suffers by comparison, but it's still a pretty good story. ( )