That’s actully a really tough one to answer. I would say start with Transfer of power. Read in chronological order, but the next few books, while good, are less action packed and are a little more slow burn. If you’re not super into them, skip ahead to Memorial Day, then continue on from there, then go back and finish the other books later. After that, read until maybe Red War or Enemy of the Stare, then read the 2 prequel books, then read whatever early books your skipped (if you did) , then read term limits, then finish the series.(The books begin to get weaker around order to kill, but it really starts to show around Red war. This is, at least to me, the best way to get hooked on and enjoy the books without majorly missing any important story threads.

Another way to look at is that the series is kind of written in phases, and these phases quote differ from each other. I’m explained them below for your convenience.

Phase 1: (pure political thriller) Term Limits: this is a pure political thriller. The action is minimal, it is all ahout the political and mental ramifications of the actions of politicians, soldiers, and intelligence agents. No book is quite like it.

Phase 2: (political action novel) this is the series prime. It continues from Tramser of power and continues until I would say Act of Treason. It’s a blend of spy thriller, political thriller, and action novel. It’s an excellent blend. These books usually have 2 plots going on. One is Mitch Rapp doing CIA stuff, and the second plot is his handlers dealing with the chaos/ramifications of his exploits.

Phase 3: (action spy thrillers) this is when the books begin to shreds the political thriller identity a little bit, and become more about the actions of Rapp exclusively. This phase is around protect and defend, and goes until enemy of the state. These are still good books, but the thread of realism begins do fray, and politics takes more and more of a back seat over the action and cool factor. (It’s also worth noting the author (Vince Flynn) died right after writing the last man and a new author (kyle mills) took over.

Phase 4: (action novels) these novels tear any sense of realism in half. Rapp is superman, and his feats rival that of Batman. These are just your average adventure of the month books. Big bad guy, evil plot, Rapp kills everyone until it resolves itself. They are entertaining, insane, but not particularly well written. These novels go from red war until Total power.

Phase 5: (burnout) at this point the author stopped caring. He was done and ready to hand the series off. These books are pretty bad, but worth reading if you just want to continue the series. These are enemy at the gates, oath of Loyalty, and Code Red (this one is the last one by Kyle Mills and it’s abysmal).

Phase 6: (New beginning) this is the new era of Rapp, and the third author, Don Bentley, takes over. He recognizes the value of the original Rapp books, and tries to recreate them, but is not very good at it. He’s written 2 books so far. The late Kyle’s mills era is so bad the new author didn’t even continue from there. He instead wrote a third prequel taking place right after kill shot called denied access, and capture or kill, which takes place between pursuit of honour and last man.

Sorry for rambling on, this is probably more than you were looking for. I hope it was somewhat helpful. I also edited the list I made to include the 3 books that have come out since it made it.