If what grabbed you in The God Engines was Captain Ean Tephe driving a starship with a literally chained god and taking orders from a theocratic hierarchy, you’ll love how Ninefox Gambit weaponizes belief itself. Kel Cheris teams up with the undead tactician Shuos Jedao to fight a fortress where calendrical “rituals” make physics obey doctrine—starships maneuver through reality like liturgy, and heresy can crash your weapons the way doubt can unmake Tephe’s “engine.” It’s the same blend of duty, faith-coded tech, and brutal consequences—only cranked even harder.

You followed Ean Tephe’s obedience to the Faith—even as a chained deity hummed in his ship’s heart—and watched belief collide with command. In The Book of Strange New Things, pastor Peter Leigh is sent to preach to the alien Oasans on a distant world, while messages from his wife back on Earth unravel his certainty. Like Tephe’s crises under his bishop’s orders and the novella’s cruel turn of revelation, Peter’s mission forces him to choose between spiritual duty and the human cost of devotion.

If the bleakness of a starship powered by a suffering god and the final, savage betrayal in The God Engines hit hard, Blindsight delivers that same merciless chill. Siri Keeton joins a crew led by the predatory commander Jukka Sarasti to investigate the alien entity Rorschach, and every discovery peels back hope. The body horror, moral numbness, and relentless dread echo the oppressive, sacrificial tone aboard Tephe’s ship—right down to the sense that the universe doesn’t owe us comfort or meaning.

Drawn to Ean Tephe’s conflicted loyalty—enforcing a bishop’s commands while a tormented god thrums below decks? The Black Company follows Croaker and his mercenary brothers as they serve the Lady and the Taken, committing grim acts under orders while trying to salvage a code of honor. As with Tephe’s compromises and the final, faith-driven knife twist, Croaker constantly measures survival and duty against his conscience in a world where power demands a price.

If Tephe’s submission to the Faith—and the catastrophic fallout of following sacred orders—stuck with you, The Sparrow will, too. Jesuit priest Emilio Sandoz joins a mission to the planet Rakhat believing it to be God’s work; what happens there shatters lives and convictions. Like the chained god that powers Tephe’s ship and the awful choice he faces, Sandoz’s journey probes the cost of wielding authority in the name of belief—and what remains when obedience breaks you.