This is my favorite book in the Star Trek universe. Considering how many there are that's saying something. The authors ability to present a story that can't possibly mesh with the original TV series and then turn it around in the last couple chapters to mesh perfectly is a delight to read. The story also captures the intent of the original series that is missing in almost all other science-fiction series, that the human race moves out into space to explore and to handle circumstances as they develop, not that we are forced out into space because of circumstances and are desperately trying to fix something.