Prepare for the action-packed, ruthless, and romantic new fantasy from the #1 New York Times bestselling and National Book Award winning author Sabaa Tahir about love, legacy, and vengeance.

An orphan.
An outcast.
A prince.
And a killer who will bring an empire to its knees.

Growing up in the Kegari slums, AIZ has seen her share of suffering. An old tragedy fuels her need for vengeance, but it is love of her people that propels her. Until one hot-headed mistake lands her in an inescapable prison, where the embers of her wrath ignite.

Banished from her tribe for an unforgiveable crime, SIRSHA is a down-on-her-luck tracker who speaks to the earth, air, and water to trace her marks. Destitute, she agrees to hunt down a killer who has murdered children across the Empire. All she has to do is carry out the job and get paid. But then, she falls for a charismatic and inconvenient fugitive who keeps getting in her way.

QUIL is the crown prince of the Empire, nephew of a famed and venerated empress, but he’s loathe to pick up the mantle when his aunt steps down. As the son of the most hated emperor in the history of his people, he, better than anyone, understands that power corrupts. When a vicious new enemy threatens the survival of the Empire, Quil must ask himself if he can rise above his tragic lineage and be the heir his people need.

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. Get ready for a dark and breathless journey that will captivate readers and that may cost these young people their lives―and their hearts. Literally.

HEIR, Sabaa Tahir
Pub: 1 October, 2024

As a writer, I tend to keep Sabaa Tahir’s work on a special shelf: my toolbox shelf.

Every writer has one. It’s full of books we love, books that have great uses of craft, books that might even be craft books themselves.

I think HEIR will fit nicely next to the other books I love to learn from.

In HEIR we follow the stories of Quil, Sirscha, and Aiz as we return to the world of EMBER IN THE ASHES, 20 years after the events of the original quartet.

As usual, Sabaa Tahir’s world building is perfection. But if you read the original quartet, you might find the opening sort of slowly paced as you are already familiar with the world and the fallout of Nightbringer’s actions. I admit, I struggled to get through the first few chapters, but I promise you it is rewarding to do so.

From here on, there will be spoilers and craft discussions:

Once we get to the invasion we’ve been firmly introduced to Aiz, a devout follower of Mother Div from Kegar, a country that is so poor and broken that it must raid the countries nearby in order to feed its people. Aiz fails to assassinate the tyrant leading her country further into ruin and finds herself, and her friends, in jail for some time.

Aiz has a WHOLE journey in prison, and this is before we’ve even jumped into the main problem of the book proper.

We get to see Aiz fall, find her faith, and rise again. But I think astute readers will be immediately suspicious of Mother Div’s sudden interest in Aiz. I know I was. Mother Div has some incredibly strong Keenan vibes.

Something about Div’s voice reminds me of the Nightbringer, smooth, desperate, determined, hungry. When Aiz escapes prison and finds her way to the tribal lands, I think Div really begins to come off the page (which is funny, because she’s been bound to a book). Aiz asks Laia, who is now Kehanni of Tribe Saif and mother to Elias’s children, to find the missing 9th Sacred Tale of Mother Div, but it takes time.

And in this time, Div’s impatience seeps out into Aiz. We really get to watch as the emotions overwhelm Aiz and confuse her as she fights down something she believes is coming from her. But we also get to witness some amazing characterizations in that Aiz twists her own personality to justify stealing and sacrificing in order to achieve her goals.

Then we have Sirscha, banished from the Jaduna for an unspeakable act and forbidden from using her tracking magic. Elias comes to her and makes her swear a sacred Jaduna oath to track down a killer, which forces her to begin using her magic in a way that might alert her tribe.

Sirscha has a great character journey as well. She battles with her past mistakes, her own family, and evolving feelings for Quil, the Prince of the Empire. She has secrets to keep for good reasons and learns to trust in others as much as in herself.

I really loved learning about the Jaduna through Sirscha’s points of view. It all gets shown through memories and trinkets rather than encyclopedic entries and it helped to connect to the Sirscha’s emotions more than a few diary like lines at the beginning of the chapters could have.

Quil has less of a change, I feel. His story is grand, involving losing love, finding it again, and working through his trauma, and it is a solidly presented tale, but he undergoes less of a change than the other main viewpoint characters. At the end, he is still the crown prince and still wants revenge for the fall of the Empire and the murder of his loved ones. Something we’ll hopefully get to see him achieve in the next book.

The world building was mixed for me. I am familiar with the world from the EMBER IN THE ASHES QUARTET and so some of the information felt repetitive, but if this is your first dive into the world then buckle up because you are in for some solid understanding and visuals.

Once the ball got rolling it never felt like it stopped. There was a lot to follow: Quil and Sirscha’s budding relationship, Sirscha’s friendship with Quil, Sufiyan, and Arelia, Quil and Sufiyan’s joint trauma at the death of Ruh, Aiz’s determinations n to save her people, Aiz’s relationship with Mother Div, the traps, the ambushes, the plans.

And almost all of it gets wrapped up. Almost. Add it to your TBR now, readers. And you too, writers. You’re going to love this.