Cover love: King Maker!

It’s no use, we just can’t keep this to ourselves a moment longer. Here’s the cover art for King Maker, book one of Maurice Broaddus‘ extraordinary Knights of Breton Court trilogy. These books, if you recall, are a retelling of the King Arthur myths, set amongst the inner city gangs of Indianapolis. It’s dark, vicious and totally of the moment: like The Wire meets Excalibur. Because when Angry Robot does urban fantasy, we never forget the “urban” part.

This art is by the fabulously talented Steve Stone of Artist Partners, whose work you will undoubtedly notice from several superb recent cover designs. Steve’s now hard at work on the covers for books 2 and 3 as well. Click on this thumbnail for a much larger version. (Hint – this would make a seriously tasty desktop.)

While we’re on cover art, what’s going on with the new habit, it seems, of “certain publishers” not to credit cover artists? Shame on you, guys, shame on you. The cover art is a big part of the experience of any fantasy novel, and as we all know a superb piece of art can sell a book regardless of the merits of its content. Credit where it is due, fellow publishers!