Sarah J. Maas Reveals Two New ACOTAR Books, Four-Part Story Structure, and TV Rights Update

Sarah J. Maas sat down with Alex Cooper on "Call Her Daddy" on Wednesday, March 4, and revealed two upcoming ACOTAR books, a never-before-seen four-part story structure spanning over a thousand pages, and confirmed she has reclaimed the screen adaptation rights to all her properties.

Spoiler warning: Major spoilers for the Throne of Glass series, A Court of Thorns and Roses series, and the Crescent City series follow.

Two New ACOTAR Books Are Coming Months Apart

The biggest reveal of the interview: fans can expect two more books from the ACOTAR series. The first arrives on October 27 of this year, and the second drops on January 12, 2027.

The conversation started with Alex asking about an Instagram post SJM shared back in June 2025, which showed her closing a book that appeared to read “ACOTAR 6-7.” The fandom spiraled over whether she was writing two full novels, a duology, or a secret spin-off.

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SJM cleared it up while poking fun at her own handwriting. “Okay, well, first of all, I guess I have really s****y handwriting, like really f***ing s****y handwriting of my like arrows and like, numbers look messed up. Like I’m ashamed of this. Like, that was not intentional at all,” she said. “But I will say that that was ACOTAR Six with the arrow pointing forward to indicate like things going ahead of that.”

She confirmed the October 27 release is the next ACOTAR book — the one fans have been waiting for since A Court of Silver Flames — and acknowledged the long gap between releases. “It’s been a long time coming. It’s something that I, it took me a long time to write, just because there were enough things going on in my life that I had to like sort through and I had to like, and again, like I will talk about that perhaps in more detail. I’ve already cried once today. Like my makeup stayed intact. Let’s not push it,” she shared. “But that, it’s taken a while because it took me a while to find the right story and to be in the right head space.”

SJM described a creative breakthrough she experienced in Montana over the summer. “I was in Montana this summer and like, I don’t know, I think there’s like some kinda like energy vortex, like around Big Sky because like I just got there and like it clicked. It all came out of me.”

SJM Won’t Reveal the POV Character

One of the most debated questions in the ACOTAR fandom is whose point of view the next book will be told from. Alex Cooper asked directly: “You can’t tell us whose POV it’s from?”

SJM’s answer was deliberately vague. “No. And that was one of the like surprising things for me, like writing this and like what came out. Like it’s, you got a lot of like, insight to like various things.”

That phrasing — “insight to like various things” — could mean multiple POVs, or it could mean a single POV character who opens windows into many storylines. SJM did not clarify further.

A Four-Part Structure Across Three Physical Volumes

The most structurally unprecedented reveal came when Alex pushed for more details about the upcoming releases. The next ACOTAR story is not one book, not a duology, and not a trilogy. It is a single massive story being released in four parts across multiple physical volumes.

SJM explained the sheer scale of what she wrote. “It’s just the story that was finally ready to come out of me was big, really, really, really big,” she said. “And as I started writing this in like this, like Montana, like energy vortex, like it came outta me in a way that surprised me. And by the time I reached, you know, I like to do like parts like part one part two, part three, by the time I gotta end of part one it was like 400 pages long.”

Four hundred pages for Part One alone. SJM explained that the physical size required rethinking how the story would be published, referencing the Throne of Glass finale. She noted that “there’s a certain reality to books like ‘Kingdom of Ash’ had to be like two because like the glue will not hold books together.”

Rather than condensing or splitting the story into separate, self-contained novels, SJM chose to let the story be as large as it demanded. “I decided I wasn’t gonna approach this project from a, you know, traditional format of a book. And what if this story, like, what if this book was really long? Like, what if it took me more than a thousand pages to tell the story that needed to be told the arc that I wanted to create from start to finish.”

The release structure breaks down as follows based on what SJM shared. Part One releases on October 27 as its own physical volume. Parts Two and Three will be combined into a single physical volume releasing on January 12, 2027. Part Four has yet to be written.

SJM emphasized that the result will be three physical volumes containing four parts of one continuous story. “So it’s basically gonna be like three physical volumes, but it’s like one thing altogether that like no amount of glue in like any publisher’s like factory could ever like hold this,” she said. “So it’s meant to be read ideally as like one massive, massive story as opposed to like in like a trilogy. It’s not a trilogy. Like arcs aren’t like wrapped up. It’s like in the way, like, you know, you take my book, it’s like if you expand it all of part one, all of part two, all parts, like all part, like it would be huge like that.”

She was emphatic that this is not a trilogy. The parts don’t wrap up neatly at the end of each volume. It is one continuous narrative that is simply too physically large for one binding.

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SJM also explained why the back-to-back release schedule matters to her. “I could not live with the idea of like publishing part one and then being like, yeah, wait like a year for like, I was like, no. Like I want that in everyone’s hands,” she said. “And so that’s why we’re doing like this, like back to back release. So there’s gonna be like a lot of ACOTAR in a very short time.”

On Part Four and the conclusion, SJM said her priority is getting the first three parts out first. “And then eventually like the conclusion will be like written like once, once I get, I wanna get these, like I don’t want anyone to wait any longer.”

She wrapped up the publishing discussion by framing the project in terms of creative ambition. “It’s you know, it’s ACOTAR, but just I’m telling it in a way that’s exciting to me and like gives me like the space that the story demanded and the characters demanded.”

Tamlin’s Redemption Arc Is SJM’s Hardest Storytelling Challenge

Cooper asked directly whether Tamlin will ever have a full redemption arc. SJM’s answer was one of the most emotionally raw moments of the interview, and she did not give a yes or no.

“I don’t know. It’s tricky because I’ve had so many women, especially including some like very dear friends of mine who like come up and told me about like how they saw their own abusive relationship mirrored in Tamlin,” she said. “And so if I were to ever write like more about Tamlin, it would be done in a way where like, it doesn’t erase what he has done and it doesn’t like invalidate the feelings of like my readers who have connected to that.”

She continued: “Like, it would have to be done in a way that was genuine to him and to reality. But also like, well aware of like what he means for like, different types of people and different experiences and to honor and respect them for that.”

SJM then shared a deeply personal detail: one of her very best friends is a survivor of domestic abuse who “often refers to her ex as Tamlin.” SJM has had direct conversations with this friend about what a Tamlin redemption arc would mean.

“I’ve actually talked to her that like, how would you feel like, you know, like if just like me as the creator, like separating us as friends, like, would that feel like a betrayal to you? And so like we’ve had like interesting conversations about it, but it’s something I’d really want to think about.”

She described the Tamlin question as “probably like the hardest thing for me to figure out, like, to be quite honest, like, that’s tricky for me.”

SJM then articulated the internal tension between her emotional response and her craft. “It’s tricky for me also just emotionally because like partying wants to be like, that f***er can burn in h**l forever. But like as a writer I’m like, but like, what is the story? What is like, and like, not to excuse him for any of it, but explore it.”

She also noted she’s “given myself like several options” when it comes to Tamlin’s future, suggesting she has been actively thinking about multiple possible directions for the character without committing to one.

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Mor’s Powers and the House of Wind Stairs

The rapid-fire fan question portion of the interview produced several notable teases about longstanding ACOTAR mysteries.

On how the non-winged Fae get into the House of Wind — the Night Court location accessed by 10,000 stairs that became especially significant in A Court of Silver Flames — Cooper asked: “How do Fae get into the House of Wind? Because they don’t have wings. Like, do they climb the stairs?”

SJM’s response was brief and loaded: “This might be something that you find out.”

On Mor’s powers, which have been one of the longest-running mysteries in the series, SJM confirmed the “truth” aspect of Mor’s abilities but then went into full tease mode. “Truth. But you like to have other powers beyond that. But I’m not gonna reveal any more about it, there might be more about that,” she said. Then she went further: “You know what, everything is possible. Everything you’re asking right now could just be like, yes. The answer is yes. You’ll find out.”

The Deleted Pinterest Board and Secret Manuscripts

For fans who tracked SJM’s online activity, one long-standing mystery has been a now-deleted Pinterest board titled “Twilight of the Gods.” The board appeared to contain aesthetics and references for what looked like an entirely new book series before it vanished.

Alex brought it up: “We’ve all seen the now deleted Twilight of the Gods Pinterest board. What’s really going on there?”

SJM explained: “Really? That was just like a story that I like. It was kinda like Crescent City where like, I always have manuscripts and other stories in my head.”

Then she dropped a detail that stands on its own. “I think I have… probably like three or four like unpublished full books for different series on my computer.”

She elaborated: “That I dunno if they’ll ever see the light of day, but, sometimes I just get a story in my head and I wanna start writing it and I get ideas for it, and it comes out, and sometimes I wanna share that with the world and sometimes I don’t.”

So “Twilight of the Gods” was one of these stories — a full idea SJM was developing and collecting visuals for, similar to how Crescent City started as a separate idea in her head. Whether it will ever be published remains entirely uncertain.

SJM Has the TV Adaptation Rights Back

The other major news from the interview concerns the long-anticipated screen adaptation of ACOTAR. In 2021, it was revealed that Hulu would be adapting the series. In 2025, it was revealed that the deal fell through.

SJM confirmed a significant development: she now has the rights back to everything. “So, I have the rights back to everything now and getting the rights back to all my things has been a big part of my journey in recent years that maybe at some point soon I will talk more about,” she said. “But right now my focus is on books and it’s been a little while since you guys have had something, so I’m focusing on that.”

She made clear a screen adaptation is still something she wants, but on her own terms. “I look at any TV movie adaptation as kind of like another facet of the worlds that I’ve created and it’s something that I want to be in charge of, I want to be figuring out, like I want to be learning everything that I can,” she said. “I’m a type A control freak a little bit, but I want to know everything about how it gets made, not because of that control, but just because I love movies. I love TV.”

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Her vision for any adaptation was emphatic. “I want to see everything adapted the way I envision it and the way I know fans want it and I don’t ever want to hear like, ‘Oh, we need to change this to appeal to XYZ’s demographic.’ I’m like, ‘No, that’s not how you make art. That’s not how I create my stories,’” she said. “So when I do it, it’s gonna be me and I will dedicate everything that I have to making it right, but I’ll be in there, you know, looking at all the design, but also like, ‘What does it sound like?’ ‘cause music plays such a big part, so I’m not just gonna, like, the music is gonna have to be like a huge project.”

SJM framed the adaptation as a question of legacy. “I view it as my legacy in a way where I’m like, I put my books out into the world. That’s one way that the fans are interacting and seeing these characters, but the physical version of that needs to be aligned. It can’t just be someone’s take on that. I’m like, ‘No.’”

On casting, SJM had a brief but honest answer about the most-debated fan cast in the fandom. On her dream casting choice for Rhys, she said: “I have yet to find my perfect Rhys.”

F**k, Marry, Kill: SJM’s Answer

In a lighter moment, Alex Cooper gave SJM the challenge of F**k, Marry, Kill with Rhysand, Hunt, and Rowan — the three primary male love interests across her three main series.

SJM’s initial reaction was practical: “I’m trying to think of the realities of my own marriage and what has worked and what doesn’t work. I’m like, ‘Which one of them farts the least?’ That’s the one I want to marry, because I live with that reality.”

When Alex pointed out that SJM literally wrote these characters, she leaned into the impossibility. “I kind of want to f**k all of them to be quite honest and marry all of them. I don’t want to kill any of them.”

'Throne of Glass' Deep Cuts

The rapid-fire segment also addressed long-standing Throne of Glass questions.

When Alex asked what Lorcan did, SJM’s answer was vague but intriguing: “Oh, someone explained this to me, like a couple months ago. I dunno, I didn’t know how to feel about it then. I dunno how I feel about it now. I mean, like, maybe like bonus content and like a surprise Christmas present sometime for all.”

On the deep-cut character Vaughn, SJM acknowledged his existence and implied there might be more. “You know, that’s actually a thing that I think about a lot. A lot. And that’s all I’ll say about that.”

When Alex asked whether the settling is the same or similar as the drop — a crossover lore question fans have debated — SJM refused to engage entirely. “Okay, let’s skip, just skip. Just skip. Just come out, come go.”

On why Aelin had to lose her powers at the end of Throne of Glass, SJM gave one of her more reflective answers. “I do think that, like, I actually really grappled with that one. Where I was like, I hate the idea of her having to give up something that she learned to love and embrace. But at the same time, I do think that there needs to be some level of sacrifice when it comes to making a decision that big. To give up something that you love for something else, like that’s powerful. I don’t think it would, the ending, would’ve felt as deserved.”

She also hinted at ongoing creative interest in Aelin’s trajectory after that sacrifice. “But then I also think it opens up again in my endless thinking about things, just in me as her creator and writing this. What does it look like for her after that? You know, like you go from like all this power and you give it up and, how does that feel? I find that there was, even with that as an ending, it felt like a different start of a journey. That just was fascinating for me.”

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How Mates Actually Work

The concept of mates — the destined romantic bond across SJM’s series — got its most direct explanation yet.

SJM described it as: “It’s kinda like your destined true love… [But] there’s a biological component to it, where you can be mated with someone who’s not your true love. There’s true-true mates, and there’s nature made a mistake. Like Rhys’ parents did not love each other, it was not a great relationship, but they were mates.”

So the mating bond is not a guaranteed happily-ever-after. There are “true-true mates” and then there are bonds where “nature made a mistake.”

Watch the full “Call Her Daddy” episode here.