An Ember in the Ashes Books in Order

Why this order?

Within the original books there is no puzzle at all. An Ember in the Ashes runs in publication order, book one to book four, and A Torch Against the Night picks up almost exactly where An Ember in the Ashes stops. If that is all you came for: An Ember in the Ashes (2015), A Torch Against the Night (2016), A Reaper at the Gates (2018), A Sky Beyond the Storm (2020), and then stop. That quartet is a finished story with a real ending, and nothing about it is contested.

The question worth opening a page for is Heir. Nothing on its cover says book five. Its publisher lists it as book 1 of 2 in the Heir Duology, a separate series from An Ember in the Ashes, and the jacket copy says only that it is set in the same world. Goodreads files it the same way, as its own duology rather than as Ember books five and six. So it looks like a clean jumping-on point, and Sabaa Tahir has said readers do not strictly need the earlier books first. In practice it is a next-generation sequel. It takes place roughly twenty years after A Sky Beyond the Storm, and while its three leads are new (Aiz, an orphan from the Kegari slums; Quil, the Martial crown prince; and Sirsha, an exiled tracker under a magical oath), Quil is the nephew of the reigning empress, a character you meet in the quartet. Starting with Heir therefore settles in its opening pages the thing the quartet spends four books building toward: who lived, and who ended up ruling. The publisher's own description of Empire names her outright. Start with Heir only if you have decided you are never going to read the quartet.

The two graphic novels are the other thing people mis-shelve. A Thief Among the Trees (2020) and A Spark Within the Forge (2022) are prequels. The first follows Elias, Helene and Tavi on a mission during their Blackcliff training; the second follows Laia and Darin in Serra before book one begins. Chronologically they come first. As a reading experience they do not, because both are built for people who already care about those characters. Treat them as optional companions, best taken after the quartet, and note two things. BOOM! Studios announced the line as a three-volume prequel series, but only two volumes have appeared and no third has been solicited as of August 2026, so do not hold off waiting for a finale that may never arrive. And A Thief Among the Trees shipped in July 2020, five months before the quartet's own finale in December 2020, which is the only reason a strict publication lane differs from the reading lane here at all.

Empire, out September 22, 2026 from G.P. Putnam's Sons Books for Young Readers, closes the Heir duology, so from late September the world is complete at six novels plus two comics. Two last shelving traps. Ember Quartet is UK branding for the same four books, not a different series or an omnibus. And All My Rage, Tahir's 2022 National Book Award winner, is a contemporary novel with no connection to the Martial Empire. On screen there is nothing to plan around: film rights were optioned by Paramount back in 2014 and no progress has been reported since.