It'll be our traditional seaside holiday in a few weeks and I fancy a Trek book to read. I'm after a TOS book post 5YM/movie years (from the Pocket Book era), I read The Lost Years on holiday last year. I'm thinking about A Flag Full Of Stars or Traitor Winds but I'd love to hear some reccomendations or advice on what you think I should read. I've read Wounded Sky and loved it.
Flag Full of Stars and Traitor Winds are both fairly forgettable IMHO, and they're not actually all that connected to Lost Years, but I wouldn't say they're actually bad, just that there are better choices. If you like Wounded Sky, for instance, you should definitely read Diane Duane's other TOS novels. (Note that some of them weren't originally (explicitly) set in the movie era, but in the current understanding of continuity that's where they'd fit.) Doctor's Orders and Spock's World are both thoroughly enjoyable, as are her first two "Rihannsu" novels, My Enemy, My Ally and The Romulan Way. As for other authors, I'd heartily recommend Federation by the Reeves-Stevenses (terrific, even if it's technically not consistent with modern continuity), Best Destiny by Diane Carey, and The Final Reflection by John Ford — although note that all three of those technically only have *framing* sequences set in the movie era, and are otherwise flashback tales to earlier periods of Trek history, so they may not be what you're looking for. For something that's genuinely focused on the movie era (set right after TMP), and relatively more recent as well (by a current "litverse" author), Christopher Bennett's Ex Machina is well worth reading. It's interesting now that I think about it how few Trek novels have been set during the TOS movie years, actually... and even fewer that are memorable... and fewer yet written within the last couple of decades. Seems to me like it would be fertile territory for further exploration, with (relatively) fewer continuity constraints, yet authors of TOS novels really seem to prefer the FYM period, for whatever reason(s).
I have to second Lawman in that Ex Machina is an interesting read. My TOS novel experience is fairly limited, however, so can't really make many independent suggestions of my own, though I do remember rather enjoying Recovery when I was about 12 and it got passed onto me by my uncle.
You might want to check out the trilogy "Star Trek Prey". It starts between Star Trek IV and V, and then jumps to 2386, but it deals with a plot point from Trek III.
Prey is good if you love love love Klingon politics and endless prattling about honor. If you don't, then it gets excruciatingly tedious by about the middle of volume 2.
I'll second lawman's recommendation of Diane Duane's books, as well as the recommendation of Federation and The Final Reflection with the caveats given. I'd also suggest Time for Yesterday if you've read Yesterday's Son. If you haven't read Yesterday's Son I'd recommend it and then Time for Yesterday, although Yesterday's Son is set before the movie era, during the 5YM or during a second 5YM that doesn't mesh with later established chronology. But both books hold up well nonetheless.
If you're looking for newer books, Greg Cox, who's become one of the main TOS writers for Pocket, has written two movie era stories in the last few years. Foul Deeds Will Rise, is a novel sequel to Conscience of the King set between The Final Frontier and The Undiscovered Country. Miasma is a e-book novella set in the same time frame.
Serpents in the Garden is set after TOS but before TMP. It's a follow-up on "A Private Little War." It's not the best TOS novel by any stretch of the imagination but it touches on some interesting pre-TMP politics relating to Klingon-Federation relations and it is an interesting look at where Kirk was leading into TMP. There's also a half-hearted subplot with Scotty, Uhura, and Chekov. It's a pretty mixed bag and YMMV.
Don't want to leave you all hanging so I went for Recovery 'cos I liked the blurb. It may be rubbish, I'm sure you'll all tell me I've made a terrible mistake , but it sounded the most interesting to me. I'm a bit disappointed by the lack of good TOS Movie era books.
I liked "death count" from that era, even if it is not the best that can be found in trek lit, it is fast paced and fun "Home is the hunter" was good as well And if you haven't read it "The entropy effect" is one of the best books I read
Another movie-era book, although that's only the framing story, is Julia Ecklar's (1/2 of L.A. Graf) 1989 "Kobayashi Maru" novel. It's TOS's version of "Pathways", where separate chapters flashback to an earlier era to see how each character (except Chekhov, who we saw in an episode of TOS) handled the no-win scenario.