Empire of Storms

About Empire of Storms

Empire of Storms is the fifth novel in Sarah J. Maas's Throne of Glass series, published in 2016 by Bloomsbury. The series follows Aelin Galathynius — also known as Celaena Sardothien — a young assassin who gradually reclaims her identity as the lost heir to the kingdom of Terrasen. By the fifth book, loyalties have been fractured and reforged, companions have been lost and gained, and the threat of the Valg — demonic beings who can possess and control humans — has reached a critical pitch.

Empire of Storms takes Aelin and her companions across the sea and into direct confrontation with the witches, the gods, and the allies she will need to wage war on an almost unimaginable scale. The novel is 724 pages and continues the sprawling, multi-character structure that defines the later entries in the series — multiple point-of-view characters, interlocking plots, and an increasingly explicit romantic register that distinguishes the Throne of Glass series from the young adult fantasy where it began.

The Throne of Glass series is one of the most popular fantasy series of the past decade, with millions of readers worldwide. Maas began writing the series when she was sixteen and published the first book in 2012. By the time of Empire of Storms, the series had moved into territory — particularly romantically — that most readers classified as adult rather than young adult, a shift that became the central issue in banning efforts.

The Throne of Glass Series

The series includes eight novels and several novellas. The first two or three books are generally considered young adult in tone and content; the later books, including Empire of Storms and Kingdom of Ash, are considerably more explicit. This tonal shift has made the series particularly complicated for school librarians, who must decide whether to shelve books in a series differently as the content changes.

Maas's worldwide readership for this series competes with that of the ACOTAR books. Both series have generated devoted fan communities and inspired a wave of romantasy publishing in the decade since. Maas has said in interviews that as she aged and her readership matured alongside the books, it felt natural for the content to mature as well.

Why Empire of Storms Has Been Banned

Empire of Storms has been banned or challenged in 12 states across 76 school districts. As with other Maas titles in the banning data, the challenges are predominantly focused on the novel's explicit sexual content. Later books in the Throne of Glass series contain scenes that are more graphic than the early installments, and this escalation has driven many of the challenges, particularly in districts where the earlier books in the series have remained on shelves without challenge.

The broader issue raised by the banning of Maas's books is the question of series continuity in library collections. Readers who begin a series with younger-age-appropriate content are invested in the characters and unlikely to abandon the series when the content matures. Whether the school library is the right venue for them to continue is a question that collections policies handle differently across different districts.