Last month I wrote a brief article about Flotsam by RJ Theodore, an intriguing steampunk/first contact novel. It was the first book I’d ever seen from Parvus Press and, as I commented at the time, it seemed like I should be paying them more attention.

That paid off this month after I ordered a copy of their very first book, Vick’s Vultures by Scott Warren. It was released in trade paperback in 2016, and has been gradually winning an audience. It has an intriguing premise: mankind is one of many space-faring species in a crowded galaxy, and has used captured alien technology to establish a tentative foothold on a handful of colony worlds. Here’s H. Paul Honsinger, author of the Man of War series.

I was on board with Captain Victoria Marin and her multinational, multi-ethnic, multi personality type, mismatched crew from the first moment. Scott Warren gives us an uncommon premise, humans as technological inferiors to most of the galaxy, and follows the plausible consequences of that premise: from our race’s particularly human adaptation to that situation – becoming pirates and scavengers of technology while flying under the radar of the major civilizations – to the cultural and character traits that come to the surface in that event. It all comes together with a richly-imagined universe, three-dimensional characters, and a fast-moving plot… [a] swashbucklingly exciting tale from a talented emerging author.

The next volume in what’s now being called the Union Earth Privateers series, To Fall Among Vultures, arrived in August. Here’s a look at the back covers for both books.

[Click the images for space-sized versions.]

And here’s the complete publishing details:

Vick’s Vultures (215 pages, $11.99 in trade paperback/$2.99 digital, October 4, 2016) — cover by Tom Edwards Design
To Fall Among Vultures (?? pages, $14.99 in trade paperback/$6.99 digital, August 10, 2017) — cover by Tom Edwards Design

You can order both books from major online retailers and directly from the Parvus Press website. While you’re there, check out their other titles, including Court of Twilight by Mareth Griffith and the upcoming anthology If This Goes On, edited by Cat Rambo.

See all of our coverage of the best new SF and Fantasy series here.