The above beautiful cover artwork by John Zeleznik is for the first of Yakov Merkin’s Fantasy trilogy, The Dragon Hand. It came out a little while ago, but I neglected to mention it in all the hectic work of the last couple of months that has kept me pretty quiet of late.

In my opinion, this is Yakov’s best book so far, with lots of likeable characters with real depth to them, a very interesting and well fleshed out world with just the right level of complex political machinations (enough to feel real and thoroughly engaging, while never being confusing), action, adventure, intrigue, romance, and not one but three different magic systems, each full of intriguing possibilities, and mysterious figures that hint at much more going on.

An orphan must overcome the past she wants to forget, a jeweller’s son has to take up the mantle he never knew he had, and a dragon has to deal with a role he never asked for; he must face threats on the border, conspiracies at home, and an otherworldly danger that dwarfs them all, but no-one else believes exists.

This was a fun book to edit, and I highly recommend it.

Yakov is also running a crowdfunding campaign for his Galaxy Ascendant space opera series, which you can contribute to here