The Sea Beyond Books in Order

Co-written with Alyc Helms as M.A. Carrick, The Sea Beyond moves away from Nadezra and into an alternate Spanish Golden Age where maps do more than record the world. Cosmographers can pin down islands of the Otherworld, sea routes matter like state secrets, and empire is built with both ships and magic.

At the center are two people tied together in a painful way. Estevan is a changeling, a faerie living in the place of a mortal child. The Hungry Girl is the human daughter sent the other direction, raised among the fae and left to figure out who she can be. Their lives run in opposite tracks, but the series gets its force from the fact that neither of them can really escape the other.

That tension powers the whole thing.

Expect ocean travel, courtly maneuvering, and a hard look at colonial ambition. Brennan and Helms are interested in exploration, but not in romanticizing empire. The wonder of the Sea Beyond sits beside violence, exploitation, and the question of who pays for conquest.

The magic is one of the most appealing parts of the setup. Geography and cartography are not neutral here. To chart a place is to shape it, fix it, and claim it. That gives the world a strong intellectual hook, while still leaving room for sea monsters, faerie bargains, and the practical terror of being far from home on dangerous water.

If you liked the dense social worlds and layered identities of Rook & Rose, this series scratches a related itch in a very different setting. The scale is larger, the horizon is saltier, and the story is driven by the collision between personal history and imperial power.