Books Like A Court of Thorns and Roses: 9 Fae Romantasy Series to Binge
Fae bargains, fated mates and court intrigue for readers who have re-read Prythian one too many times.
There is a particular kind of reader who walks into our shop, and we recognise them instantly: they have just finished A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J. Maas (possibly for the third time) and nothing else feels right. It is easy to see why. Feyre kills a wolf in the winter woods, is dragged into the faerie lands of Prythian as the price, and what starts as a Beauty and the Beast retelling swells into something far bigger: warring courts, bargains with teeth, a fated mate bond argued about in book clubs to this day, and the rare series that gets better as it goes.
The good news is that the ACOTAR itch is really several itches: the fae bargain, the mate bond, the court politics, the villain-shaped love interest, the sheer binge-ability of a long series. The nine books below each nail at least two of those, and between them they should keep you fed until Maas writes the next one.
What to read after A Court of Thorns and Roses
Throne of Glass by Sarah J. Maas
The obvious first stop, and still the right one. A teenage assassin is pulled out of a death camp to compete for her freedom as the king's champion, and what looks like a simple tournament fantasy compounds over eight books into something enormous. Maas pulls the same trick she pulls with ACOTAR, quietly raising the stakes and deepening the romance until you look up and realise you have cancelled a weekend. Persevere past the first book; the series rewards it tenfold.
From Blood and Ash by Jennifer L. Armentrout
Poppy is the Maiden: veiled, untouchable, promised to the gods, and thoroughly sick of it. Enter Hawke, a guard with a smirk and an agenda. This is the series most often pressed into ACOTAR readers' hands for a reason: forbidden romance, a world that is not what it seems, a twist that redraws the whole map, and considerably more spice. Long enough to binge properly, too.
