Nothing is quite like A Court of Thorns and Roses, which is an unhelpful thing to hear when you have just finished it. What is true is that the book does several distinct things at once — a human dropped into a fae court, a slow burn with someone introduced as an enemy, a mid-series tonal shift that recontextualises everything — and different books do each of those parts well. Here is which to reach for depending on what you are chasing.
The problem with ACOTAR readalikes
Most lists you will find are just "popular romantasy, ranked", which is not the same thing. ACOTAR’s specific hold on people usually comes down to one of three things.
Some readers are there for the world and the court politics — the seven courts, the bargains, the sense that the setting has rules. Some are there for the slow burn with the dangerous one, and specifically for the way book two reframes book one. And a large number are there for Maas’s voice, in which case the answer is simply her other two series.
If you are not sure which camp you are in, the tell is whether you re-read A Court of Mist and Fury or the first book. Mist and Fury people want the reframe. First-book people want the world.
Seven books to read after ACOTAR
Throne of Glass — Sarah J. Maas
Start here if what you loved was Maas herself. It is her earlier series and the first book reads younger than ACOTAR — but it becomes enormous, and the payoff across eight books is arguably bigger. The common advice is to push through book one and judge it on Crown of Midnight. Our Sarah J. Maas reading order covers how the three series fit together.
Fourth Wing — Rebecca Yarros
The obvious one, and it earns it. A war college, a lethal selection process, dragons that choose their riders, and a love interest who is introduced as a threat. It is faster and more plot-driven than ACOTAR and the prose is plainer, but the structural similarity — heroine thrown into a deadly world, slow-burn with the dangerous one — is exact. See also books like Fourth Wing.
From Blood and Ash — Jennifer L. Armentrout
The closest tonal match on this list. A young woman raised as a sacred vessel, forbidden to be touched, and the guard assigned to protect her. Armentrout writes the same mix of banter, heat and mythology, and the first-book twist lands as hard as the one in A Court of Mist and Fury. Seven books and counting, so there is a lot of runway.
The Serpent and the Wings of Night — Carissa Broadbent
For the court-politics half of ACOTAR. Oraya is the adopted human daughter of a vampire king, entering a tournament she is not built to survive. Broadbent is a stronger prose stylist than most of this subgenre and the world has real internal logic. Darker and less comic than Maas, and better for it if the Under the Mountain sections were your favourite.
Gild — Raven Kennedy
A King Midas retelling in which the gold-touched woman is the protagonist and the story is about getting out. It starts claustrophobic and small and expands considerably; the first book is the shortest and least representative, which trips people up. High heat, heavy content warnings, and a heroine arc that is genuinely one of the better ones in the category.
Quicksilver — Callie Hart
The most direct ACOTAR successor of the recent crop — a human woman pulled into a fae realm, a cruel and beautiful antagonist, a slow burn that takes its time. Hart writes considerably hotter than Maas and the book is long. If you want the exact shape of ACOTAR with the dial turned up, this is it.
Powerless — Lauren Roberts
The lighter, faster option. In a kingdom that has exiled the powerless, Paedyn hides what she is and ends up competing in trials alongside the prince. It reads younger than ACOTAR — closer to YA in heat and pacing — but the hidden-identity tension is well handled and the trilogy is complete, which matters if you are tired of waiting.
How these compare on heat and pacing
Powerless is the mildest and reads fastest. Throne of Glass and Fourth Wing sit roughly where ACOTAR does. From Blood and Ash, Gild and Quicksilver all run hotter, with Quicksilver the hottest of the group. The Serpent and the Wings of Night is the darkest in tone but not the most explicit.
Length is worth checking too. These are not short books — twenty hours and up is normal on audio, which is one reason romantasy has become such a strong audiobook category. Our audiobooks by subgenre guide covers the narrators worth following.
Where to go next
If the fae specifically are the draw rather than the romance structure, our romantasy explainer maps the boundary between romantasy and epic fantasy, which is where a lot of the better fae writing actually sits. For the current crop, see the best romantasy books, or browse the catalogue by trope and heat level to build your own shortlist.