10 must-read new YA book releases to make your December merry
By Lacy Baugher
A Sky Beyond the Storm – Sabaa Tahir
The highly anticipated conclusion to Sabaa Tahir’s megapopular Ember in the Ashes series arrives this month, and it’s likely that none of us are truly ready for this story to end.
A saga that follows the story of a young girl with strange magical abilities working to overthrow the brutal Martial Empire, the series has everything you could want from YA fantasy: High stakes, complex relationships, brutal twists, magic, and love.
This final book has a lot of work to do – there are many loose ends to be wrapped up, stories that need closure, and fractured relationships that deserve some sort of payoff. Whether Sky will be able to balance its many competing characters and priorities is anyone’s guess – but if the ending of the previous novel Reaper at the Gates is anything to go by, it will be certainly fun to watch Tahir try.
The official synopsis provides a great deal more detail about the story of this final book.
"The long-imprisoned jinn are on the attack, wreaking bloody havoc in villages and cities alike. But for the Nightbringer, vengeance on his human foes is just the beginning. At his side, Commandant Keris Veturia declares herself Empress, and calls for the heads of any and all who defy her rule. At the top of the list? The Blood Shrike and her remaining family. Laia of Serra, now allied with the Blood Shrike, struggles to recover from the loss of the two people most important to her. Determined to stop the approaching apocalypse, she throws herself into the destruction of the Nightbringer. In the process, she awakens an ancient power that could lead her to victory–or to an unimaginable doom. And deep in the Waiting Place, the Soul Catcher seeks only to forget the life–and love–he left behind. Yet doing so means ignoring the trail of murder left by the Nightbringer and his jinn. To uphold his oath and protect the human world from the supernatural, the Soul Catcher must look beyond the borders of his own land. He must take on a mission that could save–or destroy–all that he knows."
A Sky Beyond the Storm is available on December 1.