Junkyard Cats Books in Order

Junkyard Cats is where Faith Hunter shifts from urban fantasy into near-future science fiction, but a lot of her strengths come with her. The series takes place after war has broken the world and Bug aliens have imposed their own uneasy peace. In the middle of that battered landscape stands Shining Smith, running the old junkyard left to her by her father. It looks like a place to survive. It is also a place packed with secrets.

Shining is not fully human anymore, and that fact drives nearly everything. She lives with powers she did not ask for, responsibilities she cannot safely share, and a constant fear of what control might cost the people around her. The junkyard is home, fortress, hiding place, and future all at once. It gathers stray people, dangerous technology, and, of course, cats. The cats are not decoration. They are part of the heart of the series.

The first book opens with a dead friend, a warning note, and the knowledge that someone knows far too much about Shining and what she is protecting. From there the series expands into road fights, biker politics, roadhouse negotiations, rival power centers, and the ugly problem of how to defend your own people without becoming a tyrant. Shining wants safety. The world keeps demanding leadership.

The cats are absolutely part of the strategy.

Tone matters here. These books are rougher, more openly science fiction, and often darker around questions of power and free will than Hunter's fantasy series. There is alien tech, AI trouble, recon satellites, and the long shadow of war. But there is also the same Hunter interest in competence, community, and the cost of every bad choice. Shining has to plan, bargain, fight, and clean up after disasters. She also has to ask what loyalty really means when some of it may be influenced by forces inside her that she cannot fully trust.

Another big draw is the setting's mix of scales. The story can feel intimate, focused on a junkyard nest, a crew, and a few miles of road, and then suddenly widen into bigger questions about gangs, military power, and the technologies still buried in the world. That keeps the series moving. It also gives Shining room to grow from survivor into something more complicated.

If you want Faith Hunter with less vampire politics and more scrap metal, engines, nanotech menace, and postwar grit, this is the lane to take. Junkyard Cats still cares about found family, sharp heroines, and hard fights. It just trades New Orleans night magic for a harsher horizon, a guarded junkyard, and a woman trying to keep her people alive without losing herself in the process.