Expeditionary Force Books in Order
Part ofCraig Alanson Books in OrderBrowse the Expeditionary Force series by Craig Alanson in order, with book summaries, series background, spin off notes, and clear guidance on the ideal reading order for Joe Bishop and Skippy's adventures.
Last updated: December 26, 2025
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Publication Order
21 books
Ground State
by Craig Alanson
2026
Destroying the enemy gateway was a rare clean win, except the Pirates were too late. Two empowered foes now roam the galaxy in ships that outclass Valkyrie, and Joe must rely on risky schemes and human unpredictability to drag the war back to even.
Gateway
by Craig Alanson
2025
Disaster turns Operation Olympic from triumph to the Pirates' worst failure, shattering their advantage. With the enemy strengthened and Skippy out of the fight, Joe and the crew must attempt a miracle before humanity's last doorway closes.
Task Force Hammer
by Craig Alanson
2024
Stopping an enemy from stealing a Sentinel and destroying its Elder escort should have been a decisive win. Instead, the Pirates discover their opponent is far worse than they imagined and realize they cannot fight this war alone.
Aftermath
by Craig Alanson
2023
A stunning, unlikely victory should mean celebrations and retirement for the Pirates, but the galaxy does not cooperate. In the aftermath of their biggest battle, a new crisis erupts that only Joe, Skippy, and their friends are in position to handle.
Match Game
by Craig Alanson
2022
For years, Skippy has been the unbeatable trick up humanity's sleeve, outthinking every rival AI. When the Pirates finally run into an adversary with comparable power, Joe and his crew must help their overconfident partner survive a deadly match up.
Failure Mode
by Craig Alanson
2022
After a mission collapses and the odds go from bad to impossible, even Skippy admits the galaxy is doomed. With no clear path to victory, the Merry Band of Pirates slips into failure mode, trying to salvage a few lives from the wreckage.
Fallout
by Craig Alanson
2021
Lying about the existence of a terrifying super weapon bought humanity some breathing room, but it has consequences. As their bluff starts to unravel, the Merry Band of Pirates must manage the political and military fallout before someone calls it outright.
Breakaway
by Craig Alanson
2021
After years of skirmishes, the Pirates offer their enemies a ceasefire that would keep Earth off the board. When that deal collapses, Joe and Skippy race around the galaxy to eliminate threats while the infant UN Navy searches for much needed allies.
Critical Mass
by Craig Alanson
2020
After their last mission, the Merry Band of Pirates are battered and on the defensive while bigger dangers close in on Earth. Hostile species have noticed strange behavior in the wormhole network, and their investigation could reveal humanity's hiding place.
Brushfire
by Craig Alanson
2020
Peace is supposed to give Joe and his crew a chance to breathe, but old enemies never got the message. As the Merry Band adjusts to life between wars, fresh brushfire conflicts flare up that could ignite another galactic disaster.
Valkyrie
by Craig Alanson
2019
Convinced Earth cannot be saved by cautious moves, Joe and the crew gamble everything on hitting the enemy where it hurts most. Their hunt for a powerful alien ship tests new alliances, experimental AIs, and the limits of Skippy's improvisation.
Homefront
by Craig Alanson
2019
With Earth finally safe for the foreseeable future, the crew of the Flying Dutchman wonder what peacetime will look like. Back home, new threats erupt that drag UNEF troops, politicians, and Skippy into a fast moving crisis on the home front.
Armageddon
by Craig Alanson
2019
In the wake of the Renegades mission and chaos on Earth, UNEF reluctantly calls the Merry Band of Pirates back into action. A routine reconnaissance spirals into a confrontation that could decide the fate of whole star systems.
Renegades
by Craig Alanson
2018
After years of secret missions, the battered star carrier Flying Dutchman finally heads home for repairs and rest. Instead, Joe, Skippy, and the crew stumble into new schemes and enemies that make Earth more vulnerable than anyone believed.
Mavericks
by Craig Alanson
2018
Stranded UNEF soldiers on Paradise are folded into an alien Legion and sent on an off world training exercise with teenage Ruhar cadets. When the mission goes catastrophically wrong, Perkins's makeshift unit must fight to keep Paradise from being wiped out.
Zero Hour
by Craig Alanson
2017
An elite expeditionary force accidentally triggers an alien civil war and ends up on the run in a crippled starship. With the Flying Dutchman failing and Skippy apparently gone, Joe must keep a desperate crew alive far from any help.
Trouble on Paradise
by Craig Alanson
2017
Major Emily Perkins struggles to hold together the uneasy human presence on Paradise while the Flying Dutchman is away. A supposedly simple mission with their Ruhar allies turns into a crisis that shows how fragile the colony's safety really is.
Black Ops
by Craig Alanson
2017
The Merry Band of Pirates set out to learn whether the Thuranin plan to send another ship toward Earth. Their investigation drags them back into the tangled situation on Paradise and forces Joe and Skippy to confront a new threat to humanity.
SpecOps
by Craig Alanson
2016
Joe Bishop keeps his promise to take the captured starship Flying Dutchman back into deep space. Loaded with elite troops and scientists on a mission that looks hopeless, he and a sarcastic ancient AI must keep Earth safe from afar.
Paradise
by Craig Alanson
2016
While Joe and the Flying Dutchman patrol the galaxy, thousands of UNEF soldiers are marooned on the planet they call Paradise. Sent to check on them, Joe finds human politics, alien agendas, and hard choices that could endanger Earth itself.
Columbus Day
by Craig Alanson
2016
When the Ruhar invade Earth and are driven off by another alien race, Army specialist Joe Bishop signs up to fight among the stars. Serving in the UN Expeditionary Force, he slowly learns humanity may be backing the wrong side.
Series background & context
Expeditionary Force is Craig Alanson's flagship series, a long running blend of military science fiction, space opera, and buddy comedy. It starts on the day alien ships arrive over Earth and very quickly turns into a galaxy spanning mess that only a handful of stubborn humans and one impossible AI can manage.
In the opening volume Columbus Day, humanity is caught between two technologically advanced species, the Ruhar and the Kristang. The Kristang drive the invaders off and present themselves as saviors, then quietly recruit human soldiers into a client army that will fight their wars out on the fringe of known space.
Army specialist Joe Bishop goes from ground combat in Nigeria to escort duty on alien worlds, where he stumbles across an artifact from an even older civilization. That relic turns out to house Skippy, a hyper intelligent, endlessly sarcastic artificial intelligence whose talents put Joe in the middle of secrets that would get normal soldiers erased.
Before long Joe is commanding a stolen starship, the Flying Dutchman, and a misfit crew nicknamed the Merry Band of Pirates. Their job is simple to describe and hard to execute, keep Earth hidden from apex predators, play their alien patrons against each other, and survive missions that almost always require breaking someone else's rules.
The books move fast, jumping from desperate boarding actions and commando raids to long stretches of problem solving where Skippy and the crew argue, reference old movies, and hack around the limits placed on them by godlike species. For all the jokes, the series does not shy away from casualties, compromises, and the long term strain of endless war.
As the story grows, it spins off into side tales like the Mavericks novels, which follow the ground troops marooned on the planet Paradise, and the audio drama Homefront, which brings the fight back to Earth. Later books introduce the UN Navy, new alien factions, and galaxy changing threats tied to ancient technology and unstable wormholes.
If you are looking for a big canvas space saga with a very human core, Expeditionary Force delivers a continuous through line from Columbus Day through later entries like Fallout, Failure Mode, Aftermath, and beyond. It is a series built for readers who like their starship battles loud and their heroes a little exasperated with the universe.
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