Brotherband Chronicles Books in Order

The Brotherband Chronicles is John Flanagan’s nine-book sibling series to Ranger’s Apprentice, set in the same world and often running alongside the same events from the other side of the map. Where Ranger’s Apprentice is about a boy learning the quiet, patient craft of a Ranger, Brotherband is about Hal Mikkelson — a half-Skandian, half- Araluen boy — learning to lead a ship.

The Skandian approach to problem-solving is different from the Ranger’s approach. Where a Ranger would arrange a night ambush, a Skandian skirl would ram the enemy ship, board it, and argue about who goes first. Hal is a Skandian who builds a better ship (a smaller, faster one, a Heron) and assembles a crew of misfits — a Brotherband — around a design nobody trusts. The series is about a young captain, an unconventional crew, and a long voyage that keeps finding bigger trouble than the last one.

Brotherband crosses over with Ranger’s Apprentice repeatedly — Hal’s crew works for the Oberjarl, and that’s Erak — but the nine books form a complete arc on their own. Start with The Outcasts (2011) and read straight through The Stern Chase (2022).

If you’re reading the whole Araluen universe, we recommend slotting Brotherband after The Early Years in the combined reading order. See the full Araluen reading order for both variants.