The Red Queen's War Trilogy

Mark Lawrence is a British-American dark fantasy author whose debut novel, Prince of Thorns (2011), announced one of the most striking and divisive new voices in the genre — a brutal, morally unsparing story narrated by a teenager who commands a band of killers, set in a post-apocalyptic future disguised as a medieval fantasy. Lawrence was born on April 2, 1966, in Cambridge, England, holds dual British-American citizenship, and has a doctorate in mathematics. He works professionally as a research scientist in the field of artificial intelligence, and began writing fiction primarily as a creative outlet alongside his scientific career.

The Broken Empire trilogy — Prince of Thorns (2011), King of Thorns (2012), Emperor of Thorns (2013) — established Lawrence's reputation for morally complex protagonists, dense prose, and a willingness to explore darkness without redemptive softening. The series won the David Gemmell Legend Award for Best Fantasy Novel. Set in the same shared world, the Red Queen's War trilogy (Prince of Fools, The Liar's Key, The Wheel of Osheim, 2014–2016) returns to the Broken Empire universe with a different protagonist, the cowardly and reluctant Prince Jalan, offering a tonal counterpoint to the grimness of Jorg Ancrath. Lawrence then shifted worlds entirely for the Book of the Ancestor trilogy (Red Sister, Grey Sister, Holy Sister, 2017–2019), a science-fantasy series set in a dying world circling a cooling sun, following a young novice in a convent of warrior nuns — a radically different register that demonstrated his range.

The Abeth universe — introduced in the Book of the Ancestor trilogy — has become the primary focus of his subsequent work. The Book of the Ice trilogy (The Girl and the Stars, The Girl and the Mountain, The Girl and the Moon, 2020–2022) is set in the same world at a different time and location. The Library Trilogy (The Book That Wouldn't Burn, The Book That Broke the World, The Book That Held Her Heart, 2023–2025) continues in Abeth, exploring a vast underground library and the secrets of the world's history. His newest series, Academy of Kindness, launched with Daughter of Crows in March 2026 — a dark academia fantasy that has drawn comparisons to Fourth Wing and Zodiac Academy while retaining Lawrence's characteristic darkness and moral complexity. He has also written the Impossible Times trilogy (One Word Kill, Limited Wish, Dispel Illusion, all 2019), a science fiction series set in 1980s Cambridge featuring a teenager with cancer who discovers he is part of a time-travel experiment.

Lawrence has been open about the personal circumstances that inform both his motivation to write and his moral seriousness as an author. His daughter Celyn has severe disabilities and requires full-time care; he has spoken and written about her condition extensively, and has channelled proceeds from some of his work toward her care. The experience, he has said, has fundamentally shaped his understanding of suffering, endurance, and the value of small human moments — themes that recur throughout his work beneath the surface darkness. He is an active presence in online fantasy communities and known for his generosity in mentoring new authors through the Self-Published Fantasy Blog-Off (SPFBO), a competition he founded in 2015 to spotlight self-published fantasy fiction.