Sarah J. Maas and her books are true gifts for those of us who love romantasy, and based on what we know about the upcoming Sarah J. Maas books, she’s a gift that will continue to give in years to come. For those of us who are desperate for updates on her work, there are some exciting things in the works, particularly for ACOTAR fans. The author recently revealed the huge news that the next story set within the Court of Thorns and Roses series is going to be told across three books, and two of them already have release dates, so let’s get into it.
The Next ACOTAR Book (A Court Of Thorns And Roses Book 6)
Among the massively popular series that Sarah J. Maas has written is A Court of Thorns and Roses (a.k.a. ACOTAR), a romantasy series that follows a young human woman who finds herself brought into the neighboring land of Prythian, where the fae rule and reside in various courts. As it happens, things aren’t exactly peaceful there, and young Feyre finds herself immersed in all of what’s going on — including danger, drama, romance and beings both good and evil with centuries of history behind them. It’s a lot and, well, all of it is amazing.
As mentioned, SJM has three new books lined up for the series, starting with Book 6, which doesn’t have a title yet.
Article continues belowWhat is the ACOTAR Book 6 release date and title?
We finally know when ACOTAR Book 6 will be released! While the title and cover have yet to be revealed, it’s now confirmed that the book will drop on October 27, 2026. (Yes, this year. I could cry.) And, that’s not the only book slated to arrive in less than a year. ACOTAR Book 7 will hit shelves just a few months later, on January 12, 2027.
Why so soon after the next book, you ask? I’d normally say let’s not look this gift horse in the mouth, but Maas’s explanation gives us one really big clue about what to expect. From what she said on the Call Her Daddy podcast, Books 6 and 7 are actually three parts of the same story arc she’s putting together, and there will be another book to follow. Here’s how she explained it after revealing that when she finished writing Part 1 of this new story, it was “like 400 pages long”:
And so I decided I wasn't going to approach this project from a traditional format of a book. What if this book was really f---ing long? What if it took me more than 1000 pages to tell the story that needed to be told, the arc that I wanted to create from start to finish, what if that took a long time. What if that took beyond the constraints of a single volume. What does that look like, how do I tell that story? And so Part 1 was this huge, huge thing, and then I realized it was going to be four parts -- a book told in four parts -- so then I wrote Part 2 and Part 3, and those were really f---ing long, and so Part 4 is yet to be written, because right now I'm trying to just get Part 1, which is out in October, and then Parts 2 and 3 will be out in January as like one combined thing.
As Maas pointed out, books can only be so many physical pages before they’re too big for the binding to hold. From how she explains that it’s “not a trilogy,” I’m expecting us to be left hanging by the story after Book 6, and then again after Book 7. Here’s how she described how the story will be broken up:
So it's basically going to be three physical volumes but it's one thing all together, that no amount of glue in any publisher's factory could, like, hold this. So it's meant to be read, ideally, as one massive-massive story, as opposed to like a trilogy. It's not a trilogy.
No complaints from me, especially considering how relatively short the wait will be between 6 and 7.
Whose POV will ACOTAR Book 6 focus on?
Ah, yes, this is the question of the hour. (Vague spoilers if you’re not caught up on ACOTAR through A Court of Silver Flames.) While the first four books focused mostly on Feyre’s story, the fifth book in the series shifted gears significantly by taking us into Nesta’s corner of the drama. So it’s entirely fair to speculate that Elain would be the next POV to be explored in an upcoming ACOTAR book. Not only is she the only remaining Archeron sister not to be the center of a story in this series so far, but there’s also a lot that’s been set up around the middle sister that has yet to be explored in full.
In short, we have questions about Elain, and I have no doubt Maas has (and hopefully plans to share) the answers to them. But whether or not Elain is the actual focus of Book 5 is yet to be revealed, though. It’s entirely possible the story returns to Feyre’s POV, or centers on someone else. In the Call Her Daddy podcast, Maas was mum on the exact subject of this multi-volume story. The only thing she made very clear was that it was a big story that needed to be broken up.
I do want to highlight one other thing she said during the Call Her Daddy podcast, which wasn’t in response to the POV of these new books, but does leave me really excited to learn what (and who) this story is going to focus on. When asked about returning to the ACOTAR world to write, Maas said:
There was an element to it where... s--t that was tricky, like unrelated to the books but related to the books that I had to navigate and like figure out, and I wasn't going to ever force myself to write a book, because that doesn't make a good book. But I'm also someone who like, I take no s--t from myself, if I feel like I have writer's block, I'm like 'get your a-- in the chair and work,' but this was different ... This was a level of like, I needed to get some things sorted first. When it was ready to come out, when the right story hit me, it hit me hard, and I had a vision from the start of what it would be, how I would deliver it to you guys.
Maas is a wife and a mother and a human being with a personal life like any of us, so it’s understandable that she has to prioritize things above her writing. But it also sounds like she found a way back to her tale when the “right story” hit her, and it came in a big way. I absolutely can’t wait to read it!
What's Going On With The ACOTAR Adaptation?
There were initially plans for the ACOTAR book-to-screen adaptation at Hulu, but that project has since been scrapped. From what SJM said during the podcast interview, she has the rights back for the adaptation, but her focus is on the books. While that’s not great news in terms of the TV adaptation happening anytime soon, her comments about how involved she wants to be in things related to her work does make me optimistic that, if and when ACOTAR is adapted for the screen, the author will aim to have input in how it’s made.
The ACOTAR Books In Order
If you still haven't read Sarah J. Maas' A Court of Thorns and Roses series, here's the order of them by release date, including the fourth book, which is more of a novella (though it’s well over two-hundred pages). A Court of Frost and Starlight is a fraction of the length of the other books and the stakes are not as high, but it's still a must-read, in my opinion, as it helps reset the characters and where they are after the events of A Court of Wings and Ruin and ahead of A Court of Silver Flames. With the author referring to this next novel as Book 6, it seems ACOFAS officially counts as Book 4.
ACOTAR Book 1: | A Court of Thorns and Roses | (released May 2015) |
ACOTAR Book 2: | A Court of Mist and Fury | (released May 2016) |
ACOTAR Book 3: | A Court of Wings and Ruin | (released May 2017) |
ACOTAR Book 4: | A Court of Frost and Starlight | (novella released May 2018) |
ACOTAR Book 5: | A Court of Silver Flames | (released February 2021) |
ACOTAR Book 6 | Title TBD | Coming October 27, 2026 |
ACOTAR Book 7 | Title TBD | Coming January 12, 2027 |
ACOTAR Book 8 | Title TBD | Not announced yet |
Crescent City Book 4
The third book in the Crescent City series arrived early in 2024, and while Maas did confirm to Today, while promoting Book 3, that she has plans for a fourth, there’s no word on when that one will drop. In fact, what she said in January was:
You will have to wait a bit, but it’s on the airport taxiing line… It’s a little down… but I kind of know the vague ideas of what I want to happen.
It’s unclear exactly where Crescent City Book 4 sits on that runway, especially now that we know she has two ACOTAR books set to release over the coming months, and then another one in the works to arrive after that.
The Crescent City series follows a young woman — Bryce Quinlan — who’s half-fae and half human, and living in the world of Midgard. Like ACOTAR, the Crescent City books feature fantasy, drama, romance, chaos and a variety of magical beings. But unlike ACOTAR, Bryce’s world is much more modern — magical, no doubt, but modern in the technology and lifestyles of its inhabitants.
The tone of this series is also different, as the first book plays out as a murder mystery, as Bryce — a free-spirited, but more presently grief-stricken young woman — finds herself trying to uncover the truth behind the murder of her best friend, who was killed by a demon. This puts her in the path of Hunt Athalar, a fallen angel with a dark past (and let’s face it, a pretty dark present).
In December 2024, the book made it to the final rounds and won the GoodReads Choice award for the Romantasy category, earning just shy of 123,000 votes from readers.
The Crescent City Books In Order
Word of advice if you’re new to Sarah J. Maas — probably don’t do what I did and read the first two Crescent City books before reading most of the ACOTAR series because you think, “well, there’s fewer books in this one, so I’ll get caught up here then get back to ACOTAR.” As a relatively new reader to recent fantasy stories that aren’t Harry Potter books (or Harry Potter movies), I felt way in over my head diving into Crescent City, and if I could go back, I would’ve read all of the ACOTAR books before diving into this series. To be clear, I did come to absolutely love the first three Crescent City books and the characters, but as I mentioned above, it's tonally different from ACOTAR in some significant ways. Here’s the order they released (which is the order you should read them):
Crescent City Book 1: | House of Earth and Blood | (released March 2020) |
Crescent City Book 2: | House of Sky and Breath | (released February 2022) |
Crescent City Book 3: | House of Flame and Shadow | (released January 2024) |
At One Point, Sarah J. Maas Said She Knew What Her Next Four Books Were
In her 2024 interview with Today, Jenna Bush Hager asked Maas if she knew exactly what’s on the “runway” she spoke of (quoted in the above section about Crescent City), to which Maas responded…
Yeah, I plan years down the line … I know the next four books that I want to write, so they’re kind of in this taxiing position.
It was during that set of questions that Maas mentioned that ACOTAR Book 6 was the next one she’s writing. And she’d said prior that Crescent City Book 4 was coming at some point, which meant that -- at the time she was speaking -- there were two other unnamed projects she had planned. Whether they fit into the existing series, or they were something else, she didn't specify.
Given what we know as of 2026 about how she’s dividing up the next ACOTAR story into three books, I'm wondering if she was including ACOTAR 7 and 8 in those "next four books," or if she'd expected the whole story to fit within Book 6 at that point. In short, I don't know if this bit of information remains accurate. Technically, we know she has three ACOTAR books lined up and plans for Crescent City Book 4, which totals four books. But If she didn't anticipate how long this next ACOTAR book was when she was talking to Today, she may have been referring to two other books we still don't know about. I guess we'll have to wait for more information!
Completed Series: Throne of Glass
While ACOTAR and Crescent City have at least one new book coming apiece, Maas’s beloved Throne of Glass series concluded in 2018. Here’s the order of them, including The Assassin’s Blade, which is a collection of stories that take place before the events of Throne of Glass, and was published in 2014 (so you'll want to read that one after Book 2 - Crown of Midnight).
Book 0: | The Assassin’s Blade | (A prequel collection of stories released in 2014) |
Book 1: | Throne of Glass | (released August 2012) |
Book 2: | Crown of Midnight | (released August 27, 2013) |
Book 3: | Heir of Fire | (released September 2014) |
Book 4: | Queen of Shadows | (release September 2015) |
Book 5: | Empire of Storms | (released September 6, 2016) |
Book 6: | Tower of Dawn | (released September 2017) |
Book 7: | Kingdom of Ash | (released October 2018) |
There were plans for a Throne of Glass TV adaptation at Hulu (per Deadline in 2016), but it’s been nearly a decade since that news and there’ve been no major updates on it in recent years.
If you’re tapping your foot as though you don't already have a massive TBR waiting for you while you wait for updates on what’s coming up from Sarah J. Maas, I'm with you. I'll be sure to keep this page updated if and when there’s more news about what’s ahead for the existing series or other books Maas might have in the works.
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