Thank the Mother—it’s finally time to return to Prythian.
Over five years after the fifth installment of Sarah J. Maas’ bestselling A Court of Thorns Roses series, A Court of Silver Flames, was released, the sixth book, A Court of Splintered Harmony, will be hitting bookshelves Oct. 27.
Following years of anticipation from the readers who look at the stars and wish, Maas officially announced in March not one, but two ACOTAR books were on their way, later revealed to be titledA Court of Splintered Harmony and A Court of Forgotten Melody, respectively.
And praise the Cauldron—as the New York Times bestselling author emphasized that she didn’t want readers to have to wait too long for the seventh book, which will come out less than three months after Splintered Harmony on Jan. 12.
But the reason wasn’t just written by fate. After all, Maas shared that since both installments are closely connected, she’s releasing them “within a very short span.”
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Everything You Need to Remember About ACOTARBefore A Court of Splintered Harmony’s Release
“It’s just the story that was finally ready to come out of me was big—really, really, really big,” she shared during a March 4 appearance on Alex Cooper‘s Call Her Daddy podcast. “And as I started writing this in, like, Montana, like energy vortex, it came out of me in a way that surprised me. I like to do parts—like, part one, part two, part three—by the time I got to the end of part one, it was like 400 pages long.”
Deciding to forgo the “traditional format of a book,” Mass shared the one Middengard Wyrm-sized tale will be told in four parts—the sixth book will cover part one, the seventh will include two and three, and the yet-to-be-written ACOTAR 8 will encompass the fourth and final part.
Maas described the first three parts as “really f–king long”—and Mor doesn’t need to weigh in to show her words ring true. Indeed, A Court of Splintered Harmonyis 352 pages in its hardback, while A Court of Forgotten Melody has a length of a whopping 896 pages.
And the overall four-part, three-book spectacle has a name of its own: The Valkyrie Cycle, with each part described as a “movement.” Therefore, the sixth book’s full title is A Court of Splintered Harmony: The Valkyrie Cycle, Movement I.
As for what story ACOTAR 6, specifically, will be telling? Maas has kept mum on who may be finding love next following Feyre and Rhysand’s fated tale and Nesta and Cassian’s spicy romance.
However, when revealing the book’s title and pink-and-yellow gradient cover on Instagram in August, Maas shared the teaser, “What was broken will be remade.”
The thought-provoking line was later confirmed to be the first of the Splintered Harmony’s full description, which teases that Prythian will face the “insidious threat” of Koschei the Deathless.
“The Night Court will not stand idly by while innocents are attacked,” the description adds. “But with Prythian still piecing itself together in the wake of the devastating Hybern War, the task of uniting is proving more difficult by the day.”
With the Night Court also “reeling with recent betrayals and revealed truths,” they “must find a way to repair the splintered harmony all around them” in order to survive.
And unlike the previous full-length novels in the series, Maas and her publisher confirmed ACOSH will feature multiple point of views, similar to A Court of Frost and Starlight, along with Maas’ other series Throne of Glass and Crescent City.
Among the seven POVs who will be featured in A Court of Splintered Harmonyare Feyre, Nesta, Lucien, Gwyn and Cassian.
Additionally, Bloomsbury announced Splintered Harmony will feature all previously published bonus chapters, including Nesta and Cassian’s bonus chapter from A Court of Mist and Fury, along with two Silver Flames bonus chapters: one featuring Feyre and Rhys, and another—a much-debated chapter—from Azriel’s POV.
Speaking of Silver Flames, the last full-length ACOTAR book left us off with an epic conclusion as main protagonist Nesta triumphantly completed the Blood Rite alongside her fellow Valkyries, Gwyn and Emerie, and defeated the evil queen Briallyn.
Then, Nesta, using the Dread Trove—the Mask, the Crown and the Harp—made a bargain with the Cauldron to save a dying Feyre (and by association, Rhys) during childbirth.
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While the book ended with Feyre giving birth to a healthy baby Nyx, and Nesta accepting her mating bond with Cassian, the threat of death god Koschei, tension between courts and an impending war are still at play. (To fully get you up to speed, click here for a refresher of the ACOTAR series so far.)
But there’s also the subsequent events in the third Crescent City book, House of Flame and Shadow,that went down before A Court of Splintered Harmony.But without getting into full-onspoiler territory, Maas confirmed her three series—ACOTAR, Crescent City and Throne of Glass—all exist in a multiverse and the worlds overlap.
With that in mind, Maas has more than just ACOTAR 8 and the fourth Crescent City book cooking in the Cauldron.
“There’s one book that I’m going to be writing after this next ACOTAR book that I’m very excited about,” she teased during a Today interview in 2024. “I’m not going to say what world it’s in. I’m not going to say anything. It’s a story that’s been brewing in the back of my mind for a long time. I think it’s going to be a very emotional book for me to write, just in terms of the world I’ll be writing and the characters that might pop up.”
To find more books to dive into while curling up in the House of Wind this fall, keep reading…
Atria Books
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After all, she was the one who left the door open.
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The landscape of celebrity—and the criteria of what it means to be one—is ever-evolving, and at times perplexing. Luckily, Finger and Weber have spent the last decade breaking it down with their beloved podcast Who? Weekly, through their concept of Whos (the wannabe A-listers) and the Thems (the true stars).
Like their podcast, I Want to be Famous, is funny and engaging, but it’s also thoughtful in how it explores pop culture and how social media has changed the meaning of celebrity—plus its effect on the Who/Them binary. Though the book is just as excellent for non-listeners of their podcasts, the Wholigans can rest easy knowing the pair’s reverence for Rita Ora and all she is up to follows them onto the page.
In 1989, Livia had fled the confines of her Tennessee farm for a prestigious music scholarship on her quest to become a concert pianist. Decades later, she’s back in her Tennessee hometown, married to a childhood friend and making a living teaching piano—her past firmly in the rearview. That is, until a fateful phone call from an ex brings it all back. Weaving between two timelines, the book retraces her coming of age and the incident that ended her musical ambitions—as her present-day self looks back on that pivotal period in her life.
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The Pecks may just be the most ruthless editors you’ll ever meet. In Garmus’ sophomore outing, Batter Gray is aimlessly navigating post-grad life in ’82, until the poetry fiend earns a position at prestigious literary magazine Peck & Peck, where he soon becomes entangled with the warring brothers who lead the publication. Plus, he gets a front-row seat to the baffling lengths staffers will go to find the latest poetry great.
Wench takes the legend of Robin Hood you know and love and ages it up into a lush, magical and, we’ll say it, sexy new novel.
This time, Maid Marian is thrust into the arms of fate when her carriage—while whisking her towards Sheriff Nottingham, the evil despot to whom she’s been betrothed—is robbed by the Merry Men, a group of lethal fae. But while Marian has been taught to fear and revile the fae above all else, her time in Sherwood Forest (and alongside its mysterious yet inexplicably alluring leader Robin Hood) will challenge everything she thought she knew about good and evil and love.
