Wess’Har Wars series by Karen Traviss

The Author

#1 New York Times best-selling novelist, scriptwriter and comics author Karen Traviss has received critical acclaim for her award-nominated Wess’har series, and her work on Halo, Gears of War, Batman, G.I. Joe, and other major franchises has earned her a broad range of fans. She’s best known for military science fiction, but GOING GREY and BLACK RUN, the first books in her new techno-thriller series RINGER, are set in the real world of today. A former defence correspondent and TV and newspaper journalist, she lives in Wiltshire, England. She’s currently working on SACRIFICIAL RED, the third book in the Ringer series, and a new comic franchise.

The Books

Fiction, Science Fiction, General, Fantasy

An original six-part series about first contact, where an Earth expedition searching for a lost colony finds humans aren’t near the top of the food chain, and a disgraced copper and an alien war criminal strike up an unlikely alliance. Read the series in order, because it’s one continuous story and the spoilers are massive. You probably won’t be able to get a new copy of Crossing The Line, because although it’s still technically in print, the publisher isn’t making it available, although I’ve never been able to find out why they did this with just one book out of a series. (You can probably find a used copy, though.) It’s available as an e-book, but if that means you’ll skip it because you don’t like e-books or used copies, you’ll just miss too much of the plot to fully understand the rest of the story.
– Series’ page on the author’s website.

The books in suggested reading order

City of Pearl
Crossing the Line
The World Before
Matriarch
Ally
Judge