Sabaa Tahir is returning to the world of fantasy with a new book coming later this year.
Putnam Books for Young Readers will publish Tahir’s Heir in the fall, the press announced in a news release. It describes the young adult novel as an “action-packed, ruthless, and romantic new fantasy.”
Tahir made her literary debut in 2015 with An Ember in the Ashes, a fantasy novel that follows Laia, a scholar who goes undercover in an attempt to rescue her kidnapped brother. The novel was the first in a quartet that continued with A Torch Against the Night, A Reaper at the Gates, and A Sky Beyond the Storm.
In 2022, Tahir published All My Rage, a young adult novel about two teenagers in California grappling with racism and family problems. A critic for Kirkus praised the novel, which won the National Book Award and the Michael L. Printz Award for Excellence in Young Adult Literature, as “a deeply moving, intergenerational story.”
Heir is set in the same world as the Ember Quartet, and will be the first in a planned duology. “Beloved storyteller Sabaa Tahir masterfully interweaves the lives of three young people as they grapple with the burdens of power, the treachery of love and the devastating consequences of unchecked greed,” Putnam says.
Tahir announced the news of her novel on Instagram, writing, “AT LONG LAST, I get to share that I have a NEW BOOK out on OCTOBER 1 of this year! It is called HEIR, and has been in the works since 2020—before I even finished SKY! I am thrilled to be returning to the world of EMBER and spending quality time with new characters (and seeing old friends?)”
Michael Schaub is a contributing writer.
