Book Review: Edge: The Loner

Book Review: 'Edge: The Loner' by George G. Gilman

4 / 5 Stars

'Edge: The Loner' (125 pp., February 1972) was the first entry in the 'Edge' series of western novels issued by the New English Library (NEL) in the U.K. In the U.S., 'Edge' was published  by Pinnacle Books. 

The striking cover illustration is by the great British artist Richard Clifton-Dey (1930 -1997), who provided cover art for the first fifteen Edge novels, as well as for the 'Gringos' and 'Jubal Cade' western series, among other NEL titles.

'George Gilman' was the pen name of the writer Terry Harknett, one of a number of British authors, designated the 'Piccadilly Cowboys', who churned out western fiction for U.K. paperback publishers during the 70s and 80s. Harknett was born in 1936 and, according to a Dedication in the 2020 Hot Lead: Most Wanted special, passed away in January 2019. 

Through 1983, 61 Edge novels were published, all of them by Gilman. A detailed post on Harknett's writing career, with lots of cover art, is available here.

Google 'Edge: The Loner' and you'll get no shortage of reviews, many of them quite lengthy and in-depth, so I'll restrict my own critique to straightforward observations that are colored by my main occupation of reviewing sci-fi, fantasy, and horror fiction originating in the era from 1968 - 1988.

The transgressive nature of 'The Loner' is advertised by a blurb on the back page: 'Edge is A New Kind of Western'. And Gilman certainly set out to establish this aspect of the Edge series with 'The Loner'. 

While plot-wise the novel is a revenge tale in which Josiah Hedges, a former Union Army officer, sets out to kill the men who tortured his brother to death, what little exposition exists in the short chapters of 'The Loner' serves to frame one episode of violent action after another. And Gilman doesn't rely on oblique or euphemistic prose to communicate the violence; tissue and skin are sliced, torn, and punctured in graphic detail for a work of fiction issued in 1972.

 

The passage below is one of the milder ones appearing in the pages of 'The Loner':

‘He died for ten dollars you ain’t going to get either,’ Edge said as he sidestepped the knife thrust with ease and chopped down with his hand, the razor sliding forward, to be gripped by the handle with the blade fully exposed. It’s keen edge made a faint hissing sound as it sliced off the kid’s right ear.

The kid dropped the knife, his hand flying to where his ear had been. ‘Oh, my God,’ he whispered hoarsely.

‘He wasn’t on your side,’ Edge told him.

The kid blinked, gasped, stooped and snatched up the useless lump of severed flesh. Then he spun and ran back down the alley, away from the street. Edge picked up his hat, dusted it off, donned it and continued his interrupted stroll towards the restaurant. ‘Real nice town, Sheriff,’ he muttered.

The appearance of this style of graphic mayhem signals that, in 1972, the western genre was considerably ahead of the horror genre in leavening its works with a Splatterpunk sensibility. And this was done only three years after the publication of Harlan Ellison's 'The Prowler in the City at the Edge of the World', and two years before the appearance of James Herbert's The Rats (1974) and The Fog (1975), which are considered by Paul M. Sammon to be among the foundational novels of Splatterpunk.

It's noteworthy that in his 75-page essay 'Outlaws', from his 1990 book Splatterpunks; Extreme Horror, Sammon describes the roots and background of the Splatterpunk movement and mentions quite a variety of authors and their works. 

But missing from his essay is any mention of the 'spaghetti' -style western fiction that came of age in the 1970s through the 'Edge' novels and other works from the Piccadilly Cowboys (as well as from select U.S. authors). 

After reading 'Edge: The Loner' and other entries in the series, it's clear that George Gilman and his contemporaries belong to the illustrious ranks of those who practiced 'Extreme Horror' and pioneered the Splatterpunk genre. They arguably are just as deserving of being honored as Splat Pioneers as Harlan Ellison, James Herbert, and Shaun Hutson.

Of course, I haven't read every one of the 61 novels in the 'Edge' franchise, but for the handful of titles that I have indeed read, Gilman doesn't slacken in his dedication to the transgressive nature of the series. Witness this charming vignette from 'Edge: Slaughterday' (No. 24, Pinnacle Books, October 1977):

At the instant of impact, the deputy was lifted and slammed against the wall. He seemed to remain there for a long time, frozen into immobility. Then the sheened covering of blood flowed. And shiny white bone could be seen......The bunched intestines were a yellowish color. There was a ragged hole in the stomach and half-digested food ran out, looking like vomit. 

Summing up, Edge was indeed a 'new kind of western hero' and the Edge novels were indeed a new paradigm for western fiction. If you are a fan of Splatterpunk, then you'll want to keep an eye out for those few Edge books that still remain on the shelves of used bookstores........