One of the most highly anticipated book releases of 2025 is set for next week, less than a month into the new year: “Onyx Storm,” the latest sequel to Rebecca Yarros’ wildly popular 2023 romantasy hit “Fourth Wing.”
From Entangled Publishing’s Red Tower Books, the books follow Violet Sorrengail, a student at Basgiath War College who becomes a dragon rider. “Onyx Storm,” the third installment in Yarros’ five-book plan for her “The Empyrean” series, will land on shelves Jan. 21, two days after the potential TikTok ban goes into place in the U.S.
The connection between the two might not be apparent to those outside “#BookTok,” the large community of (mostly women) readers who create content on TikTok. But the immense impact TikTok, owned by Beijing-based ByteDance, has had on the publishing industry over the past five years cannot be denied, for it’s #BookTok that is largely responsible for the massive attention and subsequent success seen by “Fourth Wing,” along with dozens of other romance and fantasy novels that have landed on the New York Times bestseller list.
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There’s been a similar effect in Hollywood, where the latest craze is grabbing up the rights to the hottest #BookTok title, including “Fourth Wing,” which is set up as a TV series at Amazon.
Now the book industry is bracing itself for a week of frenzy surrounding Yarros’ release of “Onyx Storm” (an event eagerly anticipated by readers since “Fourth Wing’s” first sequel, “Iron Flame,” left them with a massive cliffhanger in November 2023) and how best to manage both in-person events and online marketing plans at a time when one of its best ways to communicate with customers is in peril.
Entangled Publishing
Entangled Publishing
“A lot our current communication around the events — and each store has its own social account, whether that be through TikTok or Instagram — is usually posted or featured on the store’s Instagram account,” Shannon DeVito, Barnes & Noble senior director of book strategy and customer experience, tells Variety. While a TikTok ban won’t necessarily affect that, she says, it would “change the conversation around the book release and where people decide to talk about the book.”
If TikTok is banned, “I think people are going to find spots for it,” DeVito says. “They’re gonna make [Instagram] Reels. They’re gonna use Bluesky. But we still have social tags planned and in place. It is set for TikTok right now, unless the ban goes through. And then it’s also for all of Instagram, which is where a lot of the info is for us, specifically.”
According to DeVito, more than 300 of the approximately 650 total Barnes & Noble locations have their own TikTok accounts. The stores create and post much of their own content separate from the main Barnes & Noble account and also are responsible for their in-store marketing of #BookTok titles in displays. DeVito doesn’t anticipate an immediate impact to how the stores handle the potential shutdown, given that #BookTok is a firmly established and recognizable branding tool.
“It’s not gonna be an overnight ‘It’s gone!’ because it was five years of people finding a lot of books that trend and move,” DeVito says. “The #BookTok tables are store-led, so they can decide if they want to take it down or put it up. But we’ll kind of just take it on a day-by-day basis, as we do with with all the book-selling.”
The bookselling will likely take care of itself next week, at least, as midnight-release parties are sold out at Barnes & Noble locations across the country, including a 500-person event at The Grove in Los Angeles that will feature author Yarros herself. DeVito says Barnes & Noble is prepared to shift plans if need be due to the ongoing wildfires in Los Angeles, but the event is not currently impacted. “Our main priority always, first and foremost, is booksellers’ safety and making sure booksellers who have homes in those areas or need support have that support,” DeVito says, noting that two L.A.-based stores proactively closed last week.
According to DeVito, this is the first nationwide event that Barnes & Noble has done since 2020, because the “excitement and demand” finally calls for it across all markets.
“We’ve had a lot of our stores and locations opt-in to events, that’s very much the formula for them when they have an event,” DeVito says. “But this is one that is so big that all of our stores are going to be having some sort of event. Boise, Idaho, Denver, Colorado, they have midnight release party reservations in the 400-, 500-, 600-range for this book. It’s not just about big-city living — [where] it only has to be New York, it only has to be L.A. — there is an appetite for this everywhere. Maplewood, Minnesota, Dayton, Ohio, there’s just places across the country where there are going to be hundreds of readers excited about a book release at midnight. And that is what makes it exciting to be a bookseller, but also just celebrate being in a book community. It’s exciting, and it bodes really well for this year.”
Notably, the “midnight release” aspect will be based on when it strikes 12 a.m. ET on Jan. 21, meaning customers in the Midwest will receive their copies in store at 11 p.m. on Jan. 20 and California will have their books in hand at 9 p.m. PT.
Each customer who attends the ticketed events (priced at $39.91 for The Grove location) will receive a deluxe edition of “Onyx Storm,” but the rest of their experience is up to the specific stores.
“Every event is different. Each store is going to be doing their own approach to the midnight release,” DeVito says. “A lot of stores are going to be doing cosplay contests, fan theory walls. There was a store last time for ‘Iron Flame’ release, it was in Maplewood, Minnesota, they did a ‘cross the parapet’ obstacle to get into the store. And then there’s different types of contests. There’s different origami, there’s crafting, lots of trivia, lots of, ‘What’s your quadrant?’ lots of kind of those types of games and activities.”
The book-retail giant is far from the only company prepping for the coming “Onyx Storm,” with everyone from fellow big stores like Target (which will carry a special edition of the book) to independent sellers getting in on the day-of release fun.
For romance-genre landmark outlet the Ripped Bodice (which has two locations, one in L.A. and Brooklyn), it’s one of the few times a year they’re willing to open their doors past closing time. Yarros is among the handful of authors they’ll do it for, alongside Emily Henry and Sarah J. Maas. And that’s based on proven demand for the “Fourth Wing” franchise, as social media and events manager Teresa Lynch says the Ripped Bodice’s November 2023 release parties for “Iron Flame” sold out 300 tickets “immediately” at both locations.
The fever of the fandom surprised even Lynch, who didn’t expect that outcome for events that did not feature the author. But the desire for in-person connection and activities offered on release day is just that powerful.
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“We’re trying to balance it so they actually can talk to each other more,” Lynch says of the plans for next week’s “Onyx Storm” events at the Ripped Bodice locations. “I think that was a difficulty with ‘Iron Flame,’ they were packed like sardines. Now you get a goodie bag as soon as you get in, kind of like instant gratification, that has the trivia, has everything you need to kind of celebrate and shop at your leisure as you’re in the store. And it basically forms one big line that goes to the store so you can go to all the stations that we may have — picking your dragon, doing the trivia, looking at the special merch, and then getting your book is the final reward.”
Though the online reader community might be losing its biggest place to congregate if TikTok shuts down just before “Onyx Storm” releases, the reservations and pre-orders tied to these in-person experiences showcase what is possibly a lasting effect on the larger publishing industry that isn’t at risk of being banned.
“The phenomenon, I think it just really proves that there’s so much room in romance for story, more than people think,” Lynch says. “I feel like a person who doesn’t read romance, they’re surprised maybe that there’s dragons in the book. And I think that’s just really the power of bucking expectations. And honestly, I think most books have a romance in them in some way, and that’s why our store exists, because we’re really capitalizing on all of that.”