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Book # 2
Fleet of Worlds
One of the better 'Known Space' stories that Niven has written. I'm sure this is due entirely to the fact that he teamed up with another author. This time he teamed up with Edward M. Lerner. I've never read anything by him, but I loved the influence he had on Niven's writing style.
Niven's solo novels all have the same problem in my view. The characters make these huge leaps in logic. This would be fine, except that Niven never explains those leaps to the reader. You know a character is thinking something and is molding their actions around this thought, but no clue as to what that thought would be is given.
Fleet of Worlds takes place about 200 years before the first Ringworld novel. The Puppeteer homeworld and farm planets have already started their exodus from the galaxy to avoid the Core explosion. Nessus and the Hindmost both are major characters. The book is a very interesting look at the life of the Puppeteers. The whole book flowed much better than the last Ringworld book. You also see Nessus' involvment in a number of Known Space events.
If you like any of the Ringworld/Known Space books, I think you'll like Fleet of Worlds.