Ride Theory reviewed Star Trek Log Five by Alan Dean Foster (Ballantine / science fiction -- 24532)
Fun adaptions of pretty standard ST plots
4 stars
The first two stories are your basic "race-for-a-cure" tales (Kirk and Spock are transformed into water breathers in "The Ambergris Element", and Spock needs a rare drug in "Pirates of Orion") while the third is a ragtag-team-has-to-pull-together-to-save-the-galaxy yarn ("Jihad"). Nothing wrong with any of them, but nothing exceptional either. Foster uses a few pages at the beginning to flesh out the backstory of Lt. M'ress, the catlike communications officer, but it doesn't tie in with the stories. I get the distinct impression Foster got the scripts and didn't see the animation, since physical descriptions of alien races have very little in common with how they looked onscreen. I still love the Star Trek Fosterverse -- it's canon unto itself.