In his fifth novel, Rudolph Wurlitzer has written a classic tale of the Western frontier and created one of his most memorable characters in Zebulon, a mountain man whose view of life has been challenged by a curse from a mysterious Native American woman whose lover he inadvertently murdered.

The Drop Edge of Yonderbegins in the mountains of Colorado and ends in the far reaches of the Northwest, a journey that includes the beginnings of a Mexican revolution, a voyage across the Gulf of Mexico to Panama, and up the coast of California to San Francisco and the gold fields. Along the trail, Zebulon becomes involved in a series of tragic love triangles, witnesses the death of his mother and father, and confronts the age-old questions of life, love, and death.

"Known for 1969's Nog and the 1973 script for Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid, Wurlitzer delivers a mystic western possessed of anarchic charms and incantatory beauty. Mountain-man, trapper and opportunistic beast Zebulon Shook starts the tale by getting cursed by a half-Shoshoni half-Irish woman. Doomed never to know whether he is in the spirit world, the real world or just dreaming, he departs from his homestead along the Gila River in New Mexico to sell pelts. After meeting up with his adopted brother, Hatchet Jack, and losing at cards to Delilah, a beautiful Abyssinian courtesan, Zebulon is shot during a barroom dustup and sets out for California, where the gold rush is gathering steam, bringing with it the law and order that threatens the 'mountain doin's' that he loves so dearly. Zebulon is pulled ever deeper into the era's bizarre historical footnotes: immortalized as a notorious outlaw by a reporter; narrowly missing joining the Walker expedition to colonize Nicaragua; reconnecting with Delilah at a San Francisco opium den; and finding the law and order forces dogging his heels to the last. This furiously told legend weaves history and myth into a riotous tale." Publishers Weekly (Starred Review) (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)

"Rudolph Wurlitzer takes no prisoners. An uncompromising, wild, and woolly tale." Sam Shepard

"Mesmerizing. A Western as Cline might have written one." The Times Literary Supplement (London)

"Tender, hair-raising, obscene. A somber joy to read." John Ashbery

"Sam Beckett with a six-gun and a sack of rattlesnakes." Gary Indiana

"A subversive modern novel about the bounds of love and the discontents of civilized life." Judith Thurman

Rudolph Wurlitzer is the author of the novels Nog, Flats, Quake, and Slow Fade, and the nonfiction book, Hard Travel to Sacred Places. Among his twelve produced screenplays are Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid, Two Lane Blacktop, Voyager, Walker, and Little Buddha.