It's been a long time coming. Since A Court of Silver Flames dropped in February 2021, fans have been scouring every Sarah J. Maas Instagram post and podcast appearance for the tiniest crumb of information. Then, on March 4, 2026, Maas appeared on Call Her Daddy and delivered the news everyone had been waiting for. ACOTAR Book 6 is releasing on October 27, 2026, followed by Book 7 on January 12, 2027.
With the release date locked in and the fandom fully awake again, the theories are flying and the wishlist is long. Here's a breakdown of the six things we desperately want to see in ACOTAR 6, and six things that would have us throwing the book across the room.
What we want to see
1. Elain Archeron fully stepping into her power
Elain has been the most under-explored character in the entire series. Both of her sisters Feyre and Nesta got to be messy, powerful, complicated heroines in their own right. Elain has spent most of the series making flower arrangements and looking ethereal. She's a Seer with abilities that have barely been touched on the page. She receives visions of the past, present and future and we still don't know the limits or what happens when she deliberately leans into that power.
ACOTAR 6 needs to be Elain's awakening and her coming into her own identity and her place in a world she was dragged into. She deserves an arc as rich as Nesta's. Feyre became a High Lady. Nesta became a warrior. It's time for Elain to become something entirely her own.
2. The Elain/Lucien/Azriel love triangle resolved
This is the ship war that has divided the fandom for years, and it's time for an answer. Elain and Lucien are technically mates, but she's been quietly rejecting that bond since it formed. Meanwhile, her charged, unresolved dynamic with Azriel has simmered in the background. He sees her as more than just "the pretty one," and the feeling appears mutual.
The mating bond question is fascinating storytelling territory. Does Elain accept a bond she didn't choose? Does she reject it and forge her own path? Does she choose the bond, or does she choose the man? Maas has been setting up this tension for books now and fans are ready for a real answer. Please no more longing glances and almost-moments. Whatever she decides, it should feel earned and it should feel like Elain's choice.
3. Koschei as a proper, terrifying big bad
The death-god lurking beneath the lake has been teased since A Court of Wings and Ruin and has never been given his due. He's connected to Vassa's curse, to Bryaxis and potentially to threats that extend far beyond Prythian. His roots in Slavic mythology can make him one of the most interesting antagonists Maas has ever seeded.
With a new story arc spanning multiple books, this could be the perfect moment to bring Koschei out of the background and into the foreground as the real threat. The series needs a villain with weight whose danger feels real and whose defeat will cost something. Koschei could be exactly that.
4. My girl Mor getting a meaningful arc
Poor Mor. She's been one of the most compelling characters in the series. Fiercely loyal, canonically bisexual, carrying years of trauma from what Eris and his family did to her and yet she's spent the last couple of books floating in the background with unresolved threads dangling everywhere. Maas herself teased on Call Her Daddy that the truth about Mor's powers will finally come to light.
Fans are ready. They want to know why Eris left her for dead in the snow. They want to understand the complicated dynamic between Mor and Emerie. Whether ACOTAR 6 is Mor's book or not, she deserves significant page time and a story arc that respects how much readers care about her.
5. The Crescent City connection, handled with care
By the end of House of Flame and Shadow, Maas opened a door between the ACOTAR world and Crescent City in a way that cannot be ignored. Characters from Prythian appear in that universe, events there carry consequences here. Book 6 will need to grapple with those threads.
Done well, this cross-series expansion could be extraordinary. It could be a chance to widen the world and raise the stakes in ways that feel genuinely epic. What fans want is for it to be handled with intention.
6. Real, lasting consequences
One criticism that has followed the later ACOTAR books is that the stakes don't always feel real and that beloved characters tend to survive and the Inner Circle tends to emerge more or less intact.
For a story that Maas herself has described as "really, really, really big," ACOTAR 6 needs to hurt a little. Characters should be tested in ways they can't easily recover from. Relationships should be genuinely threatened. The world of Prythian should feel like it could actually change or fall.
What we don’t want to see
1. Elain reduced to a prize in someone else's story
After everything said above about wanting Elain's awakening, the worst possible outcome would be a book that's nominally "hers" but actually revolves around two men competing for her. If ACOTAR 6 is Elain's POV, her inner life, her powers, her choices and her growth need to be at the center. The romance should only be a part of her story.
Elain has spent five books being described as the soft one. Readers are done with that box. Give her something to do that isn't garden-related. Give her a mission, a discovery, a confrontation with her own power. Let her surprise everyone, including herself.
2. An unearned Tamlin redemption arc
Tamlin is one of the most divisive characters in the entire series. The fandom has been arguing about him for years. There are those who see his actions as unforgivable and those who believe his trauma and Hidden Depths were used unfairly against him. Maas has hinted that she's not done with him yet, and she's acknowledged that any further exploration of his character will be handled with care given the abuse storyline tied to him.
The last thing ACOTAR 6 needs is a lightning-fast redemption that erases legitimate grievances and forces readers to simply forgive and forget. If Tamlin's arc is going somewhere, it needs to be slow, painful and genuinely reckoned with.
3. Mor's bisexuality sidelined again
This has been a frustration for years. Mor came out as bisexual in A Court of Wings and Ruin, and it was a genuinely significant moment followed by... not very much. Her queerness has existed largely as backstory and hasn't translated into meaningful representation on the page.
With Book 6 shaping up to be a larger multi-part arc with room to breathe, there is absolutely no excuse for sidelining Mor's full identity again. Whether she finds love, heartbreak or something beautifully complicated, her story should reflect the wholeness of who she is. Half-measures won't cut it anymore.
4. The Inner Circle being smugly perfect
One of the recurring criticisms of the later ACOTAR books is that the Night Court crew of Rhys, Feyre, Cassian, Nesta, Azriel, Mor, and Amren can sometimes feel like an untouchable clique who are always right, always powerful, and always win. Other courts and perspectives get flattened in comparison.
A story as ambitious as what Maas is promising needs the Inner Circle to have real flaws and real failures. Not everyone needs to be a villain or make a catastrophic mistake but the sense that the Night Court is just inherently better than everyone else needs to be challenged. Prythian is a wide, complicated world. Let it be.
5. The love interest resolving Elain's entire arc
Related to point one, but worth saying plainly. The moment Elain finds her person should not be the moment her story ends. One of the things that made Nesta and Feyre's arcs work despite all the romance, is that their relationships were catalysts for personal transformation. Nesta became the Nesta she needed to be. Cassian was part of that, but not the whole of it.
Elain's endgame should be “she discovered who she was, what she was capable of, and she chose a life that reflected that,” and yes, maybe that includes a wonderful partner. But the love story should serve the character and not the other way around.
6. Not merely a setup for future books
With ACOTAR now confirmed to run to at least eight books, there's a real risk that Book 6 functions primarily as setup by introducing threads and moving pieces around the board without resolving anything satisfying. That's a legitimate fear when a story is being told in four parts across three (or more) volumes.
ACOTAR 6 needs to feel like a rewarding reading experience on its own terms, even within a larger arc. Give readers a real beginning, middle and end, even if the world is still in motion when the last page turns. After five years of waiting, the fandom has earned at least that much.
October 27, 2026 cannot come fast enough. ACOTAR 6 arrives carrying five years of anticipation, a fandom full of love, and strong opinions and the promise of something genuinely massive from an author who clearly poured everything into it.
The question is whether Maas will give the story and the characters the space and the stakes they deserve. Based on everything she's said about how this book came out of her, there's every reason to believe she will.
We'll find out in October.
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