Hellspark

Hellspark is a delightful first-contact murder mystery by Janet Kagan, author of the Star Trek novel Uhura's Song. The members of the survey team on the newly discovered planet Flashfever are at each other's throats. Both the local wildlife and the local weather keep trying to zap them. No one can tell if the indigenous creatures named "sprookjes" are sapient, because they insist on parrotting the surveyors' attempts at communication. The surveyors themselves, all from different civilizations, keep stepping on one another's cultural toes. When a member of the team is found dead, no one knows whether he was killed by a sprookje or another surveyor; and the implications are unpleasant either way.