A frustrating and nonsensical bit of character development is molded into what turns out to be a fantastic conclusion. Read Full Review

The question of whether Lyla is sentient was honestly a really interesting subplot from the original series that kind of got forgotten and abandoned midway through, so it's nice to finally return to it as we enter the home stretch, even if the investigation of the question is a bit shallower and less convincing than one might hope from a writer famous for his Star Trek work, sidestepping the deeper questions in favor of an admittedly well-played twist ending. And of course it is still yet another new plot thread in a book that's always been hamstrung by its inability to pick which of its dozens of subplots to follow