Sarah Rees Brennan

Rees Brennan was born in Ireland. She obtained a Creative Writing MA from Kingston University in London^[9] and worked as a librarian in Surrey, England^[10] before moving to Dublin where she currently lives.

Rees Brennan has been writing since the age of five.^[11] She has a blog on LiveJournal which has over 4000 subscribers.^[12]

She wrote her first novel, The Demon's Lexicon, while studying for her Creative Writing MA. The publishing house Simon & Schuster obtained a three-book contract deal with her which involved an undisclosed six-figure sum. Since then she has written and collaborated on many bestselling and award-nominated works including In Other Lands and her tie-in work with Netflix.^{[citation needed]} Rees Brennan's most recent novel is Long Live Evil which debuted on the USA Today's best seller list^[2] and was a number one best seller on the Sunday Times in the UK.^[13]

Rees Brennan is a cancer survivor, having been diagnosed with stage 4 Hodgkins Lymphoma in 2017.^[14]

In October 2025, Rees Brennan was a guest on the Off the Shelf podcast^[15].

Three of Brennan's books are Junior Library Guild books: Untold (2014),^[16] Unmade (2014),^[17] and In Other Lands (2017).^[18]

The Demon's Lexicon received starred reviews from Kirkus Reviews,^[19] Bulletin,^[20] and School Library Journal.^[21]

In 2017, The New York Times included In Other Lands on their list of the fall's best young adult fantasy novels.^[22]