FORGOTTEN BOOKS: THREE "EDGE" WESTERNS

Edge #5:  Blood on Silver (1972), Edge #14:  Paradise Loses (1974), and Edge #49:  Revenge Ride (1985) -- all by "George G. Gilman"  (Terry Harknett)


Once upon a time in the 70s, seven UK writers would meet in a London pub.  They became known as the Piccadilly Cowboys, responsible for a large stream -- some 300 titles -- of paperback "adult westerns" in the 1970s and 1980s.  Their influence on today's western cannot be overstated.  They were Terry Harknett, Angus Wells, Kenneth Bulmer, Mike Linaker, Laurence James, Fred Nolan, and John Harvey.  Those seven also wrote more of their share in other genres, such as science fiction, crime, mystery, and historical;  Harvey, for example went on to write the best-selling Charlie Resnick mystery series.

Let's talk about Terry Harknett, who published books under his own name and as "George G. Gilman," "Joseph Hedges," "William R. James," "Charles B. Pike," "Thomas H. Stone," "Frank Chandler," "Jane Harmon," "Alex Peters," "William Pine," "William Terry," "James Russell," and "David Ford" as well as at least one book ghost-written for Peter Haining.  His most noted western series was Edge, with 61 volumes in the main series and 3 books in a crossover series with his character Adam Steele (who had 49 volumes in his own series by Harknett),  Both the Edge and Adam Steele series appeared under the pen name "George G. Gilman."

Edge is the name that Josiah C. Hedges took after the Civil War.   A half-breed of Mexican and Swedish descent, he entered the war as an innocent Iowa farm boy; during the four years of that war, he transformed into a vicious killer who slaughtered without compunction or remorse.  After the war he returned home to find his family murdered -- starting him on a bloody trail of revenge.  For Edge, the primary goal is survival.  He is not a psychopathic killer.  Someone may be able to point a gun at him once and live; not the case if he points the gun a second time.  And do not try to steal from him -- that would be a fatal  mistake.  But for the most part he just survives, neither causing nor looking for trouble.  Also for the most part, he has an expressionless face which sometimes can hide cold fury and white-hot anger.  Edge carries  rifle and a revolver, as well as a sharpened razor hidden in a pouch on the back of his neck, underneath his long dark hair; he can be lethal with all three.

In Blood on Silver, Edge stops by a farmhouse in the foothills of the Sierras.  There's a wedding going at the back of the house, with dozens of neighbors in attendance.  While Edge was in the barn seeing to his horse, a gang of killers headed by a renegade Quaker rode in and slaughtered everyone at the wedding -- men, women, and children -- except for the bride.  While Edge watched from the barn, the Quaker tied the bride upside down by her ankles over a well, demanding to know where a cache of silver was hidden.  The tortured bride had no answer and soon was killed also.  After the gang rode off empty-handed, Edge got out of the barn and fixed himself something to eat.

Edge then comes across a couple of hard luck, not very intelligent robbers, who were to meet up with the rest of their gang which had stolen two and a half grand from a wealthy businessman.  The two hardluck outlaws tried to kill Edge but he ended up capturing them for their bounty.  Riding to turn the two in he comes across the other members of the gang, who draw on him.  Edge kills the four outlaws, including their leader, Miller, and commandeers the loot for himself.  Twenty-five hundred dollars was far more than the hundred he would have gotten on the bounty for his two prisoners, he takes the money on hand and lets the two go.  One of them tells him that he has killed the son of Jake Tabor, the man who led the raid on the wedding party, and Jake Tabor was not the forgiving kind.

Not only does Edge have the Tabor gang on his trail, he crosses with a brutal band of Shoshone warriors, a giant Zulu loyal to Mason Wilder (the man who lost the two and the half grand), who then hired Edge to safely get his daughter to San Francisco.  And then there was a fortune in silver to be had.

Paradise Loses has Edge come across two men bound and dangling over a flooding river, destined to drown as the river rises.  He frees the two and off they go.  Soon riders from the town of Paradise come up.  Paradise is a religious community settled by strict Puritans who are quick to punish those who violate their rules.  It turns out that the two Edge had rescued had drifted into the town with another man and the two had lecherous thoughts about on of the town's women.  Thus they were bound over the rising river and God would decide their fate.  The third man had gone so far as to put hands on the woman so he was sentenced to die; Edge would soon see him thrown over a cliff to have his body severed on landing.  Edge figures that none of this is his business since in the previous book he had been a town called Hate where they hanged a man for spitting in the street.

Edge leaves Paradise fairly unscathed, not realizing that the "Angels" (as the people in Paradise are called) had picked his pocket and taken all his cash.  As he leaves, the two men he had rescued came back looking for vengeance, and they brought a band of twenty bloodthirsty Spokane Indians with them.  Massive slaughter follows.

Paradise Loses is also the sixth book in the series to incorporate Edge's Civil War experiences in a series of flashbacks.  The flashbacks actually take up more than half the book, with each chapter having a flashback, followed by Edge's experience in Paradise.  (The only indication that you are switching from one storyline to another is a single space line, making it a bit confusing for the ready to figure out where he is.)   During this series of flashbacks, Edge and his company of six men  try to assassinate Jefferson Davis, fail, and are captured.  Brought to the Confederate prison in Richmond, they have until morning to escape the gallows,  Edge's men are as lethal as he is, although some of them kill just for the fun of it.  The bloodbath that follows has dozens of Confederates blown up, shot, dismembered, drowned, and otherwise meeting a dismal death.

Revenge Ride begins when Edge rides up to an isolated ranch near the Mexican border, hoping he can find water and food.  What he finds, however, is a man tied and buried up to his neck, burning in the hot Southwestern sun, a group of buzzards waiting nearby for the man to die.  The man says that he was knocked out and buried by the two women who own the place.  The women were lesbians and he thought one of them was interested in him so he tried to have his way with her.  The women then rode off to town for supplies.  Edge frees the man and is rewarded by being hit in the back of the head by a shovel.  He comes to (with some possible aftereffects) to find the women treating his wound.  His guns, money, horse, and saddle are all gone; the once-buried man, named Delmar Pyle. had also wrecked the women's home and possessions.  Edge is determined to go after Pyle, regain his possessions, and kill the man.  The two women are also hungry for revenge, and promise to stake Edge if they allow them to accompany him and if he does kill Pyle.

Pyle, a hard luck loser and addicted gambler, has a title to half interest in a Mexican gold mine said to be worth more money than a man could spend in a lifetime.  As he heads toward Mexico, Edge and the women follow.  Along the way, Pyle keeps falling to his gambling habit and has to kill a number of people to regain a stake.  The  body count in this novel pales in comparison to the other two, but be assured that there are guts, brains, and innards strewed throughout the landscape in this tale, along with needless killing and torture.

The Edge series was touted as the most violent western series ever and it basically earns that reputation.  As noted, however, much of the violence does not come from Edge, who appears to be just trying to get along and to survive.  Edge's world is a dystopian one.  Violence and death are an everyday occurrence.  Few people survive an Edge novel.

Unlike many of the adult westerns of the time, and those that followed, there is no emphasis on sex.  Despite having opportunities, Edge is not interested in sex when his survival is at stake.  Violence may happen to some women and occasionally one will be stripped naked, but there is no rape and very little titillation.  Edge is also tolerant of homosexuality.  In the flashback's in Paradise Loses, a member of Edge's group is gay; the other members make fun of this, but Edge does not.  A person's worth lies in his ability to help Edge survive and not in his sexual preferences.  Edge does not disapprove of the lesbians in Revenge Ride.  He figures that each person o\f made differently and it is none of business how.

The Edge books are also laced with quirky humor, anachronistic jokes. and tasteless puns -- something that added to their popularity.  The action is spaghetti-western fast and while Edge is not a character to emulate, he is one to empathize with.  It is no wonder that the series has gained cult status.

It may not be your particular cup of tea, but for those with a semi-strong stomach, the series is orth checking out.