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I finished reading (or listening since it was an audio book) to Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle's Mote in God's Eye.

And I was wondering if there is a suggested order to read their books? Plain chronological or is there any other suggestion?

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Most Niven & Pournelle collaborations are stand-alones, and can be read in any order.

They do have some works with sequels. In almost all cases, the first book was originally stand-alone, and the sequel came out years later.

The Moties

  1. The Mote in God’s Eye (1974)
  2. The Gripping Hand (1993)

The Burning City

  1. The Burning City (2000)
  2. Burning Tower (2005)

Heorot

  1. The Legacy of Heorot (1987)
  2. Beowulf’s Children (1995)

Inferno

  1. Inferno (1976)
  2. Escape from Hell (2009)

Unrelated Works (no particular order)

Jerry also wrote a number of works leading up to Mote in his CoDominium/Empire of Man universe. Most of them are part of the Falkenberg’s Legion saga, which is set roughly 900 years before Mote:

  1. West of Honor

  2. The Mercenary

  3. Prince of Mercenaries

  4. Go Tell the Spartans

  5. Prince of Sparta

    Note: The book Falkenberg’s Legion is a compilation of West of Honor and The Mercenary. The book The Prince is a compilation of the entire saga.

King David’s Spaceship takes place more or less simultaneously with The Mote in God’s Eye, but is pretty much stand-alone.

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    I believe The Burning City and Burning Tower are set in the same universe as Niven's The Magic Goes Away and it's associated shorter works. Can anyone tell us if one needs to read the earlier works to read the Burning novels?
    – Goodbye Stack Exchange
    Commented Feb 5, 2012 at 7:48
  • @neilfein, they are, but Burning City wasn't my taste. I only read a few chapters. so I can't really say.
    – cjm
    Commented Feb 5, 2012 at 7:52
  • Yeah, me too. (mustaddmorecharacters)
    – Goodbye Stack Exchange
    Commented Feb 5, 2012 at 19:47
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    Jerry Pournelle's daughter Jennifer wrote a sequel to Mote called Outies (no, the title is not very original!). I like it better than The Gripping Hand but not as much as Mote. FWIW.
    – David Faber
    Commented Jul 17, 2014 at 4:28

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