Her Heir Chronicles young adult contemporary fantasy series was originally published by Hyperion from 2006 to 2008, with two more installments in 2013 and 2014.
Her fortune-telling grandmother and the Celtic magical beliefs in her native Jackson County heavily influenced her writing.
Chima was also a freelance contributor to The Plain Dealer (Cleveland, Ohio) and other local and regional publications, focusing on health-related topics and personal essays about family life.
[2] While she was shopping around The Warrior Heir, she began a high fantasy series for adults called Star-Marked Warder.
They have been named Booksense and Indie Next picks, an International Reading Association Young Adult Choice, a New York Public Library Book for the Teen Age, to the Kirkus Best YA list, and the VOYA Editors' Choice, Best Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror, and Perfect Tens lists.