Shadow Lord

Not the best Trek story. First off, this is a Sulu and Spock story, taking place entirely on the planet of Angiran. The main character is in fact prince Vikram, making this story read not quite as a Trek novel. This is not really a problem in and of itself, except that the story is simply not that engaging. My main beef with this book though is the atrocious dialogue. It either comes off as forced, meaningless, cringe, or (mostly with Spock) out of character. But even more importantly, the premise of the main plot, which revolves around a civil war taking place on a planet with flint-lock level technology, simply makes no sense. When the Federation is involved with pre-warp cultures, it's never by choice, due the prime directive. In this novel, we see massive Federation interference on the world of Angira. In fact, the perceived influence of the Federation on the reforms enacted by the prince's father is the reason for the civil war. The whole plot goes against established Trek cannon.