Kurland, Michael 1938-

(Michael Joseph Kurland, Jennifer Plum)

PERSONAL:

Born March 1, 1938, in New York, NY; son of Jack (a manufacturer) and Stephanie (a dress designer) Kurland; married three times (divorced three times). Education: Attended Hiram College, 1955-56, University of Maryland, 1959-60, foreign study in Germany, 1960-61, and Columbia University, 1963-64. Politics: Whig. Religion: Secular Humanist. Hobbies and other interests: Politics, bear baiting, barn storming, lighter-than-air craft, carnivals, vaudeville, science fiction incunabula.

ADDRESSES:

Home—Petaluma, CA. E-mail—michael@michaelkurland.com.

CAREER:

Full-time writer, 1963—. News editor, KPFK-Radio, Los Angeles, CA, 1966; High school English teacher in Ojai, CA, 1968; managing editor, Crawdaddy Magazine, 1969; editor, Pennyfarthing Press, San Francisco and Berkley, CA, beginning 1976. Occasional director of plays for Squirrel Hill Theatre, beginning 1972. Military service: U.S. Army, Intelligence, 1958-62.

MEMBER:

Authors Guild, Authors League of America, Mystery Writers of America, Science Fiction Writers of America, Institute for Twenty-First-Century Studies, Baker Street Irregulars, Computer Press Association.

AWARDS, HONORS:

Edgar scroll from Mystery Writers of America, 1971, for A Plague of Spies, and 1979, for The Infernal Device; American Book Award nomination, 1979, for The Infernal Device.

WRITINGS:

FICTION

(With Chester Anderson) Ten Years to Doomsday, Pyramid Publications (New York, NY), 1964.

Mission: Third Force, Pyramid Publications (New York, NY), 1967.

Mission: Tank War, Pyramid Publications (New York, NY), 1968.

Mission: Police Action, Pyramid Publications (New York, NY), 1969.

A Plague of Spies, Pyramid Publications (New York, NY), 1969.

The Unicorn Girl, Pyramid Publications (New York, NY), 1969.

Transmission Error, Pyramid Publications (New York, NY), 1971.

(Under pseudonym Jennifer Plum) The Secret of Benjamin Square, Lancer Books (New York, NY), 1972.

The Whenabouts of Burr, DAW Books (New York, NY), 1975.

Pluribus, Doubleday (Garden City, NY), 1975.

Tomorrow Knight, DAW Books (New York, NY), 1976.

The Princes of Earth, Thomas Nelson (Nashville, TN), 1978.

The Infernal Device (also see below), New American Library (New York, NY), 1979.

(With Barton Whaley) The Last President, William Morrow (New York, NY), 1980.

Psi Hunt, Berkley (New York, NY), 1980.

(With H. Beam Piper) Death by Gaslight (also see below), New American Library (New York, NY), 1982.

Gashopper, Doubleday (Garden City, NY), 1987.

Ten Little Wizards (for young adults), Berkley (New York, NY), 1987.

Star Griffin, Doubleday (Garden City, NY), 1987.

Perchance, New American Library (New York, NY), 1988.

A Study in Sorcery, Ace (New York, NY), 1989.

Button Bright, Berkley (New York, NY), 1990.

Too Soon Dead, St. Martin's Press (New York, NY), 1997.

The Girls in the High-Heeled Shoes, St. Martin's Press (New York, NY), 1998.

The Infernal Device & Others: A Professor Moriarty Omnibus (contains The Infernal Device, the previously unpublished The Paradol Paradox, and Death by Gaslight), St. Martin's Minotaur (New York, NY), 2001.

The Great Game, St. Martin's Minotaur (New York, NY), 2001.

The Empress of India, St. Martin's Minotaur (New York, NY), 2006.

Author of editorials for National Examiner, 1966, and of "Impropa-Ganda" column in Berkeley Barb, 1967. Contributor to Worlds of Tomorrow.

NONFICTION

The Spymaster's Handbook, Facts on File (New York, NY), 1988.

World Espionage: A Historical Encyclopedia, Facts on File (New York, NY), 1993.

A Gallery of Rogues: Portraits in True Crime, Prentice-Hall General Reference (New York, NY), 1994.

How to Solve a Murder: The Forensic Handbook, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1995.

How to Try a Murder: The Armchair Lawyer's Handbook, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1997.

The Complete Idiot's Guide to Unsolved Mysteries, Alpha Books (Indianapolis, IN), 2000.

Also contributor of other titles to the "Complete Idiot's Guide" series.

EDITOR

Avram Davidson, The Redward Edward Papers, Doubleday (Garden City, NY), 1978.

The Best of Avram Davidson, Doubleday (Garden City, NY), 1979.

(From H. Beam Piper's unfinished manuscript) First Cycle, Ace Books (New York, NY), 1982.

My Sherlock Holmes: Untold Stories of the Great Detective, St. Martin's Minotaur (New York, NY), 2003.

Sherlock Holmes: The Hidden Years, St. Martin's Minotaur (New York, NY), 2004.

SIDELIGHTS:

Michael Kurland is a prolific author of both fiction and nonfiction. With over thirty novels to his credit, he has published in genres from mainstream fiction to mystery. His first novels dealt with science fiction themes, and he built a notable career in that genre. However, by the 1980s he had moved to mystery and has become best known for his novels featuring the fictional nemesis of Sherlock Holmes, Professor Moriarty. These include The Infernal Device, Death by Gaslight, The Great Game, and the 2005 title Empress of India. Kurland has also edited and contributed stories to two Sherlock Holmes anthologies: My Sherlock Holmes: Untold Stories of the Great Detective and Sherlock Holmes: The Hidden Years.

As a science fiction author, Kurland is, as Richard A. Lupoff noted in Twentieth-Century Science-Fiction Writers, "highly adept at creating societies which are compellingly believable and populating them with vivid and sympathetic characters. His style is lively, warm, and highly informal. His stories are told with rapidity of pace and great variety of setting and incident." Kurland's first novel was a collaborative effort with Chester Anderson. Ten Years to Doomsday concerns a planet with only a decade to prepare for a planned invasion. In order to defend themselves from the attack, the people determine that they must change their feudal state to an industrial and technological one. Kurland says that this novel is intended as a parody of the works of Poul Anderson. Lupoff commented: "Either as a parody or in its own right, the book is fairly successful."

Kurland once told CA: "The Unicorn Girl is part of a unique trilogy, the middle work of a linked three-book opus with three different authors. The first [is] The Butterfly Kid by Chester Anderson, and the third [is] The Probability Pad by T.A. Waters." The Butterfly Kid includes the three authors as characters in a comical plot involving an alien invasion of a bohemian community in the 1960s. The Unicorn Girl continues with the same themes and characters, although it was less successful than the first part of the trilogy.

The protagonist of Transmission Error is considered likable, resourceful, and witty by critics but constantly finds himself in difficult situations. For example, he is inadvertently taken to an alien planet where he faces a potential life of slavery. Although he escapes this threat, he soon finds himself facing other challenges. Lupoff pointed to Transmission Error as an illustration of the weakness of many of Kurland's novels. He explained: "Their major flaw is a failure—whether by the author or his protagonist—to grapple with and satisfactorily resolve problems. The ‘solutions’ offered are almost invariably flight rather than confrontation."

Pluribus is regarded as Kurland's most successful science-fiction novel. Set in a future barbaric United States, the novel is replete with vivid imagery such as the horse-drawn Highway Patrol cruiser that carries the protagonist away after his arrest. The Princes of Earth, which Lupoff deemed "favorably comparable to standard [Robert] Heinlein juveniles," contains typical Kurland elements—future societies, characters, and movement from problem to problem. The author also uses satire, as in his parody of the Church of Scientology.

Kurland's writing career changed direction in 1979 when he was commissioned to write a Sherlock Holmes pastiche by a paperback publisher, but not from the point of view of the great detective. Thus he chose Holmes's archrival, Professor Moriarty. But in Kurland's interpretation, Moriarty is not the "Napoleon of Crime" that Holmes makes him out to be. Rather he is a highly intelligent and resourceful man who happens to steal from the rich; otherwise he attempts to do good. The first Moriarty title, The Infernal Device, led to a contract for further titles. Death by Gaslight appeared in 1982, The Great Game in 2001, and five years later came Empress of India. Allen O. Pierleoni described the Moriarty books in the Sacramento Bee as "fascinating, historically accurate reads in which Moriarty is shown not as some deranged genius with no regard for human life, but as a calm, sophisticated adventurer who happens to be a criminal. At the same time, Holmes is rather humorously depicted as obsessive in his suspicions that Moriarty is behind every crime committed in London."

The Great Game finds Moriarty joining forces with Holmes to prevent the assassinations of Queen Victoria of England and Emperor Franz Joseph of Austro-Hungary. A Publishers Weekly reviewer praised this work as a "deliciously complex and abundantly rewarding novel," and further commended the dialogue, which "sparkle[s] with wit, erudition and unerring diction." Writing in Booklist, Connie Fletcher noted the Moriarty novels were "acclaimed for their historical accuracy and adept plotting," going on to comment that in the Great Game, Kurland succeeded in bringing "fin de siecle Europe to brilliant life."

In Empress of India, Moriarty is unjustly accused of stealing a shipment of gold from the eponymous cargo ship and decides to catch the real villain and thus clear his name. A Kirkus Reviews critic felt that this title "carries forward the never-ending franchise with authentic flavor." Similarly, Booklist contributor David Pitt concluded: "This one's ideal for Holmes experts and novices alike."

Additionally, Kurland has served as editor for anthologies of Sherlock Holmes tales. Margaret Flanagan, reviewing My Sherlock Holmes in Booklist, found the collection "extremely entertaining." Kurland's second Holmes anthology, Sherlock Holmes, fills in the missing months in the great detective's life from when he seemingly fell to his death on the Reichenbach Falls in 1891 until he returned to 221 Baker Street in 1894. A Publishers Weekly reviewer felt Kurland "scores again in this lively all-original anthology."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

BOOKS

Twentieth-Century Science-Fiction Writers, 3rd edition, St. James Press (Detroit, MI), 1991.

PERIODICALS

Booklist, July 1, 1975, review of Pluribus, p. 1109; April 1, 1978, review of The Princes of Earth, p. 1249; March 1, 1987, review of Star Griffin, p. 983; July, 2001, Connie Fletcher, review of The Great Game, p. 1988; December 15, 2002, Margaret Flanagan, review of My Sherlock Holmes: Untold Stories of the Great Detective, p. 737; December 15, 2005, David Pitt, review of Empress of India, p. 28.

Kirkus Reviews, March 15, 1975, review of Pluribus, p. 333; February 15, 1978, review of The Princes of Earth, p. 205; April 1, 1980, review of The Last President, p. 465; February 1, 1987, review of Star Griffin, p. 178; January 15, 1997, review of Too Soon Dead, p. 99; July 1, 1998, review of The Girls in High-Heeled Shoes, p. 934; June 1, 2001, review of The Great Game, p. 775; December 15, 2002, review of My Sherlock Holmes, p. 1809; December 1, 2005, review of Empress of India, p. 1258.

New York Times Book Review, August 31, 1980, review of The Last President, p. 17.

Publishers Weekly, March 21, 1980, review of The Last President, p. 54; February 6, 1987, Sybil Steinberg, review of Star Griffin, p. 88; January 27, 1997, review of Too Soon Dead, p. 80; July 30, 2001, review of The Great Game, p. 65; January 6, 2003, review of My Sherlock Holmes, p. 42; October 11, 2004, review of Sherlock Holmes: The Hidden Years, p. 59; November 14, 2005, review of Empress of India, p. 46.

Sacramento Bee (Sacramento, CA), August 21, 2006, Allen O. Pierleoni, "Elementary, My Dear Kurland."

Washington Post Book World, June 1, 1980, review of The Last President, p. 10.

ONLINE

Best Reviews,http://www.thebestreviews.com/ (July 6, 2001), Harriet Klausner, review of The Great Game; (January 26, 2003), Harriet Klausner, review of My Sherlock Holmes; (November 29, 2004), Harriet Klausner, review of Sherlock Holmes: The Hidden Years; (January 14, 2006), Harriet Klausner, review of Empress of India.

BookLoons.com,http://www.bookloons.com/ (November 20, 2006), Tim Davis, review of Empress of India.

Michael Kurland Home Page,http://www.michaelkurland.com (November 20, 2006).