If the Naxid coup and the ensuing task-force showdowns hooked you in The Praxis, you’ll love how Leviathan Wakes escalates from a single ship crisis into system-wide confrontations. Where you watched Gareth Martinez thread the needle through vector-driven battles, you’ll follow James Holden dodging UN/MCRN fleets after the Donnager’s destruction, while Detective Miller’s hunt adds the same ground-level tension that Caroline Sula brought whenever protocol and street-smarts collided.

Loved the way the Naxids use legality and ceremony to strangle the Fleet, and how Sula outplays committees with a well-timed bow or breach of etiquette? In A Memory Called Empire, Ambassador Mahit Dzmare navigates Teixcalaan’s court—where poetry can topple ministers and a greeting can be a declaration of war—with the same razor-edged diplomacy. The palace intrigue around Emperor Six Direction and Nineteen Adze scratches the itch for high-stakes power plays that echoed through the Praxian succession crisis.

If Martinez’s climb from sidelined officer to battle-tested commander thrilled you—the inspections, the drill, the gutsy calls under fire—then On Basilisk Station delivers that same satisfaction. Honor Harrington takes an unfashionable posting, whips an underperforming crew into shape, and uncovers a threat no one else sees, culminating in a desperate engagement where procedure meets audacity—very much the energy of Martinez transforming a forgotten command into a fighting ship.

Drawn to Caroline Sula’s forged identity and her willingness to do the necessary thing—even if it isn’t pretty—during the Naxid uprising? Ninefox Gambit pairs Captain Kel Cheris with the infamous tactician Shuos Jedao, a genius whose methods (and history) are as unsettling as they are effective. Their assault on the Fortress of Scattered Needles channels the same delicious tension of backing a commander you might not fully trust to keep their hands clean—but can’t afford not to follow.

If the vectored burns, time-on-target salvos, and realistic comms delays in Martinez’s engagements are your jam, The Risen Empire doubles down. Captain Laurent Zai’s pursuit battle is all delta-v bookkeeping and brutal kinetics, while Senator Nara Oxham’s debates mirror the strategic calculus you saw around the Praxian Fleet. It’s that same fusion of precise orbital mechanics and high-stakes command decisions that made the task-force clashes in The Praxis so tense.