# Sarah J. Maas - Maker: Novelist - Date: b. 1986 - Canonical: https://www.lanternhall.org/makers/sarah-j-maas/ > The New Yorker who began posting an assassin-Cinderella story online at sixteen and grew into the best-selling queen of romantasy with Throne of Glass, A Court of Thorns and Roses and Crescent City. **Why it matters:** Maas fused epic fantasy worldbuilding with adult romance and fairy-tale retelling, and her 75-million-plus sales helped turn romantasy into publishing's defining fantasy boom of the 2020s. ## Quick answers **Who is Sarah J. Maas?** The New Yorker who began posting an assassin-Cinderella story online at sixteen and grew into the best-selling queen of romantasy with Throne of Glass, A Court of Thorns and Roses and Crescent City. **When was Sarah J. Maas born?** Sarah J. Maas was born in 1986 in New York City. **What is Sarah J. Maas known for?** Sarah J. Maas is best known for A Court of Thorns and Roses. **Why does Sarah J. Maas matter to fantasy and games?** Maas fused epic fantasy worldbuilding with adult romance and fairy-tale retelling, and her 75-million-plus sales helped turn romantasy into publishing's defining fantasy boom of the 2020s. ## Life Sarah Janet Maas was born in New York City on March 5, 1986, and grew up on Manhattan's Upper West Side, raised Jewish by a Catholic mother and a Jewish father. She has credited Garth Nix's *Sabriel* and Robin McKinley's *The Hero and the Crown* with igniting her love of fantasy, and has also named film scores, classical music, *Buffy the Vampire Slayer* and *Sailor Moon* as influences. At sixteen she began writing an assassin's story and posted chapters, as *Queen of Glass*, on FictionPress.com, where it drew a large online following before she took it down to seek publication. She studied creative writing, with a minor in religious studies, at Hamilton College, graduating magna cum laude in 2008. There she met Josh Wasserman, a resident assistant in her dorm; they married in 2010 and live in New York City with their two children. ## Work Maas signed with an agent in 2009, and Bloomsbury bought *Throne of Glass* in March 2010. Its pitch was a fairy tale turned inside out: "What if Cinderella was not a servant, but an assassin? … what if she didn't attend the ball to meet the prince, but to kill him?" The heroine, Celaena Sardothien, competes to become the king's champion, and the series widened across seven novels and a novella collection into a war for a continent, ending with *Kingdom of Ash* in October 2018. [A Court of Thorns and Roses](https://www.lanternhall.org/works/a-court-of-thorns-and-roses/), written in 2009 and published in 2015, began as a loose retelling of "Beauty and the Beast." Nineteen-year-old Feyre Archeron, a huntress from an impoverished human family, kills a wolf in the woods and is taken as payment into Prythian, a land of immortal High Fae ruled by rival courts. The sequels turned the story in unexpected directions, most famously *A Court of Mist and Fury* (2016), which recast the apparent villain Rhysand as the romantic lead. Explicit romance, found family and court politics wrapped around [Fairy-Tale Fantasy](https://www.lanternhall.org/atlas/fairy-tale-fantasy/) and faerie lore made the series a phenomenon, especially among adult readers, though it was initially shelved as young adult. *A Court of Silver Flames* (2021) shifted focus to Feyre's sister Nesta. Her third series, *Crescent City* (2020–24), set fae, angels and shapeshifters in a modern city with phones and nightclubs, an [Urban Fantasy](https://www.lanternhall.org/atlas/urban-fantasy/) turn that eventually revealed links to the ACOTAR world. As of 2024 she had sold more than 75 million copies in 40 languages. Maas's work has also drawn criticism, notably for its handling of racial and LGBTQ+ diversity, and her books, especially ACOTAR, have been among the most challenged in U.S. school and public libraries; in 2024 Utah's school board removed six of her titles under a new state law on sensitive materials. ## Legacy *Vox* has called Maas the "reigning queen" of [Romantasy](https://www.lanternhall.org/atlas/romantasy/), and the genre's explosion in the 2020s, fueled by social media book communities and by successors such as [Rebecca Yarros](https://www.lanternhall.org/makers/rebecca-yarros/)'s [Fourth Wing](https://www.lanternhall.org/works/fourth-wing/), runs through her. *The Independent* compared her to [J. K. Rowling](https://www.lanternhall.org/makers/j-k-rowling/) for her ability to inspire devoted fandoms and complex, caste-divided worlds. Her [High Fae](https://www.lanternhall.org/bestiary/elf/), beautiful, dangerous and bound by bargains, drew on centuries of faerie folklore but reframed them for readers who wanted desire and agency at the center of the story. Screen adaptation has proven elusive. Hulu optioned ACOTAR in March 2021, with Ronald D. Moore developing it alongside Maas, but by 2024 the project had stalled and in 2025 it was scrapped. Meanwhile the books keep coming: after completing a first draft in July 2025, Maas said in March 2026 that the sixth through eighth books would form "a book told in four parts," with the sixth ACOTAR novel scheduled for October 27, 2026, the seventh for January 12, 2027, and an eighth still to be written. ## Facts - She started Throne of Glass at 16 and posted chapters, then titled Queen of Glass, on FictionPress.com, where it became one of the site's most popular stories. - Throne of Glass asks, "What if Cinderella was not a servant, but an assassin?" - A Court of Thorns and Roses, a loose retelling of "Beauty and the Beast," was written in 2009 but not published until 2015. - She had sold more than 75 million copies in 40 languages as of 2024. - A Hulu adaptation of ACOTAR developed with Ronald D. Moore was announced in 2021 and scrapped by 2025. - The sixth ACOTAR book is scheduled for October 27, 2026, with a seventh following on January 12, 2027. ## Sources and further reading - [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_J._Maas) - [A Court of Thorns and Roses on Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Court_of_Thorns_and_Roses) --- From The Lantern Hall (https://www.lanternhall.org/), a museum of fantasy literature and roleplaying games.