The Bone Raiders -- Jackson Ford, Paperback

The start of a no-holds-barred, action-packed fantasy series from the always irreverent Jackson Ford where a group of charmingly-named Bone Raiders harness the power of gigantic, fire-breathing lizards to defend their homeland from an invading enemy.

You don't mess with the Rakada. The people living in the Great Grass call them the Bone Raiders, from their charming habit of displaying the bones of those they kill on their horses and armor.

But being a raider is tough these days. There's a new High Chieftain ruling the Grass. He's had it with the raider clans, and plans to use his sizeable military to do something about it. And then there are the araatan: fire-breathing lizards the size of elephants - one of which happens to turn up in a cute little settlement the Rakada are in the middle of raiding.

Sayana is a Rakada scout, and in the chaos of the raid-gone-wrong, she finds herself on the back of a rampaging araatan. Whoops. In a panic, she discovers she can steer it, like you would a horse. It's frankly amazing she survives any of this. Once Sayana gets an idea into her head, it's awful hard to dislodge. And now she has a doozy: what if the Rakada could swap their horses for araatan? Train the lizards to act as mounts? That would even the odds against the High Chieftain, no?

Author: Jackson Ford
Publisher: Orbit
Published: 08/12/2025
Pages: 480
Binding Type: Paperback
Size: 8.25h x 5.50w x 1.16d
ISBN: 9780316577694

About the Author

Jackson Ford is a pseudonym for Rob Boffard, a South African writer currently living in Vancouver. He is the author of the critically acclaimed Frost Files series about a government operative with telekinetic powers. He has released four science fiction novels under the name Rob Boffard, and was previously a journalist for over a decade, writing articles for publications and sites including the Guardian, the BBC, Wired and io9.