Onyx Storm is Book 3. Start with Fourth Wing → Iron Flame → Onyx Storm. Do not skip books — the series has heavy continuity and the emotional payoffs depend on everything built before.
If You Want More Empyrean First
Fourth Wing – Rebecca Yarros
Violet Sorrengail enters Basgiath War College and bonds with not one but two dragons — including a rare black dragon whose rider, Xaden Riorson, is her most dangerous enemy. If you haven't started the series, this is where to begin. The world-building, the enemies-to-lovers tension, and the final revelation that changes everything make it one of the most propulsive romantasy debuts in years.
Find on Amazon →Iron Flame – Rebecca Yarros
The revelations of Fourth Wing are weaponised in Book 2 — the world is bigger and darker, the romance is tested by secrets Xaden has been keeping, and the threat from the venin escalates from background dread to immediate danger. Longer and angrier than Fourth Wing; readers who loved the first book tend to feel even more strongly about this one.
Find on Amazon →Core Romantasy (Essential Next Reads)
A Court of Mist and Fury – Sarah J. Maas
The second ACOTAR book is widely considered the best romantasy novel ever written. Feyre escapes suffocation and discovers the Night Court — a world of found family, real partnership, and a love that respects her power rather than requiring her to diminish it. If Onyx Storm's Violet/Xaden dynamic is what you love, Feyre/Rhys is the ur-text. Read A Court of Thorns and Roses first.
Find on Amazon →From Blood and Ash – Jennifer L. Armentrout
Poppy has been sheltered and controlled her entire life — and her guard Hawke is the one person she's forbidden from wanting. JLA's series has the same heat level as Yarros, the same slow-burn forbidden dynamic, and a world that keeps expanding with each reveal. The fandom overlap with the Empyrean series is enormous — most readers who love one love both.
Find on Amazon →A Court of Silver Flames – Sarah J. Maas
Nesta Archeron and Cassian's combustible dynamic, explored at full length. This is the most explicit ACOTAR book — higher heat than anything in the Empyrean series — and the Nesta redemption arc is one of the most satisfying in the genre. If you loved Violet's journey in Onyx Storm (growth through adversity, magic she doesn't fully control), Nesta's arc is the closest parallel.
Find on Amazon →Epic Fantasy with Strong Romance
An Ember in the Ashes – Sabaa Tahir
A Scholar girl infiltrates the empire's military academy while a soldier struggles with the brutality he's trained to enact. Tahir's world is as brutal as Yarros's Basgiath — characters die, loyalties fracture, no one gets out unscathed — and the dual-POV structure (enemies who slowly understand each other) mirrors the Violet/Xaden dynamic in structure if not in tone.
Find on Amazon →The Cruel Prince – Holly Black
Jude is a mortal in the faerie courts — powerless, dismissed, and plotting to take power anyway. Black's Faerie trilogy has the same court-politics tension as Onyx Storm's war college hierarchy and the same enemies-to-lovers dynamic where the female protagonist is more ruthless and competent than anyone expects. Darker in tone, slightly lower heat, equally propulsive.
Find on Amazon →Shadow and Bone – Leigh Bardugo
Alina Starkov discovers she has a rare power the empire needs — and is taken from her army unit to train with the Grisha, the elite magical soldiers. The military-academy setting, the discovery of unexpected power, and the complicated mentor-love interest dynamic map directly onto Fourth Wing's template. The Netflix adaptation introduced millions of readers to this world.
Find on Amazon →Six of Crows – Leigh Bardugo
Set in the same Grishaverse, this is Bardugo at her best: six criminals executing an impossible heist, each with a backstory that makes them more rather than less sympathetic. The ensemble dynamic — multiple love stories woven through high-stakes action — is what Onyx Storm readers who want more political complexity tend to gravitate toward next.
Find on Amazon →Dragons Specifically
Eragon – Christopher Paolini
A farm boy finds a dragon egg and becomes a Rider — the first in a generation. Paolini wrote this at 15 and it shows in places, but the dragon-rider bond and the sense of a world with its own dense history are as richly developed as anything in Yarros. The Inheritance Cycle (4 books) is the closest pure-dragon equivalent to the Empyrean series in scope.
Find on Amazon →Dragonflight – Anne McCaffrey
The founding text of the dragon-rider subgenre. Lessa impresses a queen dragon and becomes a Weyrwoman as a deadly Thread falls from the sky. McCaffrey invented most of the tropes Yarros draws on: the psychic bond between rider and dragon, the war college equivalent (the Weyr), the female rider in a male-dominated world. Essential reading for fans who want to understand the tradition.
Find on Amazon →His Majesty's Dragon – Naomi Novik
Napoleonic Wars, but with dragons as an aerial corps. Captain Laurence bonds with a rare Celestial dragon and joins the Aerial Corps — a military institution with its own culture, hierarchy, and politics, much like Basgiath. Novik's series (Temeraire) is lighter in tone and lower in heat than Yarros but the military-dragon-world-building is the most fully realised in the genre.
Find on Amazon →Kingdom of the Wicked – Kerri Maniscalco
Emilia makes a deal with a demon prince to solve her twin sister's murder in 19th-century Sicily. Darker and more gothic than Yarros, but the same enemies-to-lovers tension with a morally grey male lead who is genuinely dangerous — and the same high-stakes stakes where the female protagonist must decide how much she's willing to risk.
Find on Amazon →| Book | Heat Level | Dragon Content | Romance Centrality |
|---|---|---|---|
| Fourth Wing / Onyx Storm | High | Central | Very High |
| ACOMAF | High | None | Very High |
| From Blood and Ash | Very High | None | Very High |
| An Ember in the Ashes | Medium | None | High |
| Dragonflight | Low | Central | Medium |
| Six of Crows | Low-Medium | None | Medium |