THE RAPIST cover!

Hi folks,

I'm really... I mean... REALLY jazzed! Jon Bassoff, my publisher at New Pulp Press has just sent me the cover for my nihilistic novel, THE RAPIST, and it's just gorgeous! Take a look and see what you think. (Just click on it to enlarge it.)

The publication date is March 20, 2013, but it may be offered early in a pre-pub sale. I'll keep you informed.

This novel is the best work I've ever done and I'm extremely proud of it. I cannot wait to have a copy in my hot little hand! It'll come out as a paperback and an ebook.

Please keep it in mind next spring when it's available!

Blue skies,
Les

P.S. Here are some of the other blurbs that will appear in the novel. Also, Cort McMeel is writing the forward for it. Cort was the initial champion for it and has a lot to do with it getting into the right hands and published.

Other blurbs:

BLURBS FOR THE RAPIST

1. Les Edgerton presents an utterly convincing anti-hero. The abnormal psychology is pitch-perfect. The Rapist ranks right up there with Camus' The Stranger and Simenon's Dirty Snow. An instant modern classic.

Allan Guthrie, author of Slammer and others. Publisher, Blasted Heath Books

2. So, I’m reading Les Edgerton’s The Rapist. The title has already made me uneasy.

Five pages in and I can hardly breathe.

Ten and I’m nauseous.

For the next 50, I’m a mixture of all of the above, but most of all, angry.

I feel like ringing my feminist friends and confessing: Sisters, I’m reading something you will kill me for reading.

I feel like ringing my ex colleagues - parole officers and psychologists who work with sex offenders in Barlinnie Prison, Glasgow - and asking them if they think it’s helpful to publish an honest and explicit transcript which shows the cognitive distortions of a callous, grandiose, articulate sex offender; one which illustrates his inability to have a relationship with a woman and his complete lack of empathy?

I’m thinking I don’t know what I should be thinking.

Will it turn sex offenders on?

Should we listen to this guy?

Is it possible to separate the person from the offence, and to empathise with him as he waits to die?

I don’t ring anyone.

I read on.

And the breathlessness, nausea, anger and confusion increase all the way to the end, at which point all I know is that the book is genius.

Helen Fitzgerald, author, Dead Lovely, Bloody Women, The Devil’s Staircase, Donor and others.

3. Take a Nabokovian narrator trying to convince the reader of his innocence and filter it through An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge and you've got The Rapist, a raw and frightening journey through the inner psyche of a damaged man.

Brian Lindenmuth, Publisher, Spinetingler Magazine and Snubnose Press

4. One never knows what to expect when reading a novel entitled “The Rapist,” yet, similar to “The Bitch” which precedes this, with Les Edgerton you know you're in for an interesting ride. Tackling a tough subject with great aplomb, Les Edgerton proves once again why he is one of the most exciting writers of this generation. The structure of this just astounded me. I've never read anything like it before. I've never been so engrossed in a novel as I was with this one. I had no idea Edgerton had this literary part of his writing. I don't know of any other writers that can go from crime fiction to literary so seamlessly. Edgerton should be very proud of this novel...

One of the bravest pieces of fiction you are likely to read this year, and also one of the best. This is a novel you'll want to read again and again, an outstanding read!

Luca Veste, author of the story collections Liverpool 5, and More Liverpool Five. He is also the editor of the story collection, Off the Record

5. The Rapist blends Camus and Jim Thompson in an existential crime novel that is as dark and intoxicating as strong Irish coffee. Les Edgerton pulls us into the corkscrew mind of Truman Ferris Pinter, a twisted man with skewed perception of the world, as his life spirals toward oblivion, like dirty dishwater down a plughole. It reminded me of Jim Thompson's Savage Night in its delirium.

Paul D Brazill, Author, 13 Shots Of Noir and others.

6. Les Edgerton’s book The Rapist is Albert Camus’ The Stranger retold as if by the lovechild of Edgar Allen Poe and Charles Bukowski. Yes, it’s disturbing, yet layered and provocative, with its combination of mysticism and perversion. I particularly like the cat and mouse relationship between the protagonist Truman and the prison warden—it’s reminiscent of The Shawshank Redemption. This tale, with its many twists and turns, is definitely not for the faint of heart—but then, the title should have made that clear.

Scott Evans, Editor, Blue Moon Literary and Art Review, Author, First Folio

7. William Faulkner on steroids or Hannibal Lecter on meth; neither as literate or frightening as Les Edgerton in his ground-breaking novel, The Rapist. This intellectual tour-de-force rips open the mind of a delusional psychopath taking the reader on a raw journey that challenges Dante’s Inferno. And the last line of the book is the penultimate example of a sociopath’s naked ego.

R.C. Stewart, author of The Blackness of Darkness, No Remorse and others.

8. A deathdream swan dive from the existential stratosphere plummeting into the personal hell of a tormented, broken psyche, The Rapist introduces us to a gentle and philosophical misanthrope named Truman Pinter, at once reminiscent of Albert Camus and Patricia Highsmith, even John Gardner’s Grendel and the journal of Carl Panzram. Les Edgerton melds introspection and visceral, human brutality in this death row narrative from a masterful storyteller, whose dissection of a psychopath will haunt you long after the final page.

Thomas Pluck, Well-known commentator on the noir scene, many short stories published in magazines such as the Utne Reader, Editor of the anthology, THE PROTECTOR.

9. The Rapist is a disturbing look into the twisted mind of a narcissistic psychopath on death row. A vulgar odyssey reminiscent of Nabokov’s Lolita, although far more depraved, Les Edgerton has crafted a dark and brilliant story that leaves you as equally unsettled as it does in complete awe.

Julia Madeleine, author of No One To Hear You Scream and The Truth About Scarlet Rose

10. When Les Edgerton asked me to read an ARC of “The Rapist” he warned me with that title it may not be my thing and he was okay with whatever I decided. I knew of his writing books like Hooked: Write Fiction That Grabs Readers at Page One & Never Lets Them Go and Finding Your Voice: How to Put Personality in Your Writing  but never had looked at any of his fiction. I was prepared for something graphic but he refused to talk about the plot or storyline. No hints.

I was ready to be offended. I’m a strong advocate for women’s equality and won’t tolerate or put my name near anything that belittles woman.  With a title of “The Rapist” it had two and a half strikes before I read the first line because rape is all about a man having power over a woman.

From the first pages the words and voice made me think of American literature masters like Mark Twain and Edgar Allen Poe I was forced to read in high school. The difference was in school I still muttered about reading dead masters and times, but grew to love the descriptions, plots and characters that transported me to another moment in history. In “The Rapist” I read greedily to see where the book was going, totally engrossed in the story. The honesty and freshness of the words from the main character kept me glued to the page to see what happened to the man caught in the worst circumstances and an act of degradation to woman. That is about all I want to say about the plot. I understand Les’s reasons for not explaining the details. You need fresh eyes to appreciate it but that isn’t to say I won’t go back and reread it like other writing masters savoring it. It is one of those books that each time you read it, you find another kernel of truth, a pearl of wisdom. It has that many facets wrapped in rich layers of dialogue, characterization and setting that pounded with each of the rapist’s heartbeat. I was hooked from the first page.

Wendy Gager, author of A Case of Infatuation, A Case of Accidental Intersection, and A Case of Hometown Blues.

11. Les Edgerton’s masterly The Rapist is a deeply disturbing journey into the murky recesses of the mind of psychopathic death row inmate Truman Ferris Pinter. An intellectual, erudite, philosophical misanthrope, Truman draws the reader inexorably into his fractured web. There are times when one nods one’s head in agreement with his well-reasoned arguments, only to shrink back in horror at the realisation. Sympathy for The Devil, indeed, in this dark vision of a black heart that is both astoundingly honest and ultimately terrifying.

Lesley Ann Sharrock former publisher/editor Moondance Media, author of 7th Magpie.