Terran Republic series is about Earth fianlly meeting some alien races after it had expanded to a handful of planets. There is lots of politics and maneuvering among the races and earth is kind of caught in that. A secret org on Earth tries to guide earth through all the mess and the protagonist is recruited into this org.

Icarus hunt is about a pair with an old spaceship (Icarus) being hired to take some cargo to a different planet. However, major corps and races start looking for their ship trying to get hands on the cargo.