A Complete Five Book Series of Awesome Fun

The Triple Strike series begins with Threads of Fate. As it opens, we meet Alan, a space bus passenger who hopes to finish the novel he’s reading before arriving at his destination. But his hopes are dashed when the bus is stopped by a group of privateers. Their leader is quite charismatic, but this isn’t exactly a good time for Alan to be kidnapped. Despite the Princess Bride quote that kidnapped by pirates is good, Alan is certain it’s actually very bad. Particularly as he’s been chained against his will to a stolen item that really doesn’t need to be associated with anyone working for his human anti-piracy agency.

This launches us into daring adventure and banter-filled romance as Alan grows closer to privateer captain Sven despite Alan’s job fighting piracy. Through shenanigans with Sven’s tight-knit crew, a few treason charges, interplanetary disputes that hit too close to home, and the occasional grandly heroic action, we follow as the pair join forces to save known space while falling for each other in adorable fashion.

Read this series if you...

• Love quirky space operas.
• Have a soft spot for roguish captains or dashing spies.
• Enjoy relationships between manic pixie boys and men who strive to be dignified. Or who at least try to act like grown ups most of the time.
• Appreciate a good ship’s crew as found family narrative.
• Are as addicted to banter as I am.
• Can handle a romance that starts with one party kidnapping the other.
• Wish to support independent LGBTQ+ fiction.

Odd Aliens

Sven and his crew are pyreans. It’s an interesting alien race featuring the pointed ears and extended lives of Vulcans or elves. Unlike Vulcans, they aren’t particularly attached to logic. In fact, I’m tempted to say they’re generally averse to it. They value passion above all with making things interesting being a priority for most of them. They say their species was born to wander the stars and a swashbuckling drive for adventure is their most dominant genetic trait.

Centuries ago when they made contact with humanity, it appears someone showed the pyreans Pirates of the Caribbean and they decided this was the new direction their society had been looking for. They now glorify romantic portrayals of Earth’s Golden Age of Piracy to the point they’ve established a piracy division of their official navy. (A silly premise? Perhaps. A fun premise? Certainly!)

The Pyrean Navy Piracy Division marks rank with earrings, shuns uniforms, and, yes, detains and robs human ships. The pyreans view this as a form of toll for using space gate technology, seeming to find the randomness of not knowing if you’ll have to pay it or not as a fun game that adds value to the practice.

To their credit, these official Navy Pirates don’t condone the darker actions of real world Earth pirates. They’ll disarm a person rather than killing them if they can, don’t engage in sex-based crimes, and don’t conscript people. They do occasionally kidnap indiduals with high ransom values, but seem to treat them nicely while they’re guests on the pirate ships.

Technically, Sven is not a pirate. He’s a state-sanctioned actor with permission to prey only on human vessels while leaving pyrean ones alone. That’s privateering. It’s not a distinction anyone whose ship he robs ever seems to appreciate. Or which his own government seems to care much about as they call it the Piracy Division, not the Privateering Division. Also, he’s actually a member of the Pyrean Navy, so not a private citizen merely helping the navy OR someone they would consider a criminal…. Which makes both labels fit poorly. But pyreans are alien, so I’m okay with all this murkiness.

Lovable and In Depth Characters

A successful romance needs to have two (or more) likable leads for the reader to pull for. Otherwise, readers may end up in a situation where they’re hoping these people don’t get together as the likable one so obviously deserves someone better.

I’m happy to report that both Sven and Alan are highly likable. But I’m not going to lie; Sven is my favorite character not just of the two but overall in this series. And if someone told him that, he’d respond along the lines of, “Obviously.” Which is part of what I love about him. He’s not all swagger though. Beneath that are layers of insecurity, compassion, and genuine love for the people in his life. He’s young for a captain, part of a system whose promotion schedule I found myself completely baffled by, and the projection of over-confidence is part of how he pulls that off. But mostly the crew is loyal to him because he’s loyal to them. And, well, if someone has to be in charge, it might as well be the wittiest person on the ship, right? It is, after all, better to win your enemies over with flirtation than to have to fight them.

Alan plays the not-so-straight straight man to Sven’s puckish rogue and has a lot of backstory going on. He’s a government agent from Earth and comes from the type of rich and powerful family that doesn’t expect their offspring to go into government service, at least not at any rank below that of Senator. But he’s also part pyrean and in the pyrean sphere all anyone sees is that his now-retired great-grandfather is considered the greatest pirate of all time. Which brings up a lot of emotions for the reserved Alan, who adored his great-grandfather as a child before feeling abandoned by him after his mother grew ill and whose job is now all about foiling pirates. In contrast to Sven, Alan tries to keep his emotions in check, or at least out of other people’s view. Sometimes he conceals them so well he doesn’t even notice them himself. This makes it all the sweeter when he begins to demonstrate his affection for Sven while also allowing us to be impressed by the depths of hurt and anger his great-grandfather provokes.

Of course, Sven and Alan aren’t the only people in this series. An assortment of vivid secondary characters really make the story pop. From Sven’s kid sister, raised in the shadow of looking remarkably like their brilliant but now tragically dead elder sister, to Alan’s longtime work partner, the secondaries shine with details and vibrant characterization. Everyone who crosses the page, from Alan’s illustrious (notorious?) great-grandfather through Sven’s professor mother and on to common crew members, feel like genuine individuals and real people. Whether they’re there to provide depth to someone else, to bring in humor, to invoke a stronger emotional reaction over an event, or simply to advance the plot, they all contribute to a broad and engaging tapestry of crewmates, family members, and adversaries.

A Completed Series

As indicated earlier in the recommendation, this series is complete after five books. That’s a good thing for you. If you read the series, I expect you’ll be particularly relieved that you don’t have to wait between the end of Book 3 and the start of Book 4.

Seriously. I got to the conclusion of Book 3 with a feeling of panicked anxiety. It was the least cozy part of the entire series. I was supposed to go to sleep when I was done, but there was no way that was going to happen. If I hadn’t been able to start the next volume right off the bat, I may have been forced to hunt down the author and kidnap them. (I’m not half as charming as Sven, but maybe they wouldn’t have minded so much? People do visit my house for vacations, so it’s not all bad here… I’d be happy to cook and clean for them, and it’s always nice to have a personal servant, right?)

If you’re the kind of person who wants to know a series will be finished in a timely fashion before you start it, it’s safe to read this one. Although the author has indicated they intend to revisit this setting at some point, their next project isn’t related at all and the ending is very solid.

Content Summaries

Cozy/Intense Scale: (5 is OMG! INTENSE! And 1 is So Cozy You Can Fall Asleep To It)
The series is MOSTLY a cozy 2 overall but has jumps up to 4-5.

Spice Level: (0-5)
2. There’s a lot of flirting and a lot of banter. There’s a little bit of kissing. And there is sex, but it’s all closed door.

Vibes:
Moderately goofy and fun with deviations to sweet and touching

Representation:
G.M. Gray is nonbinary and the leads… Don’t establish their sexuality, really. But they’re two men who fall in love with each other and enjoy off-page sex scenes. Sven reads to me as probably gay while Alan comes across as gray or maybe demisexual. (Alan begins the series engaged to a woman who he loves as a friend but isn’t particularly attracted to. I didn’t get the impression the lack of attraction was gender-based though.) The societies, human and alien, portrayed in the series are queer-normative and no one really seems to feel a need to label themselves. Sven also has an artificial hand, although it functions much like a biological one. And I'm tempted to label Sven as ADHD even though it's not explicitedly stated that he has it.

Advisories:
In addition to featuring a kidnapping romance trope, there are a few other possible triggers. The series contains ship-to-ship space battles as well as close-up violence, including sword fights, ranged weapon shooting, and hand-to-hand combat. At one point this includes violence against a teen. I didn’t find any of the violence particularly graphic or disturbing, although some of it did have a strong emotional impace. It is also fair to say the series contains a lot of normalizing acts of privateering/piracy.

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You can find purchase links to the books in this series on G.M. Gray’s linktree.