Michael Joseph Kurland is an American author, best known for his works of (in chronological order) science fiction

Science fiction

Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...

 and detective fiction

Detective fiction

Detective fiction is a sub-genre of crime fiction and mystery fiction in which an investigator , either professional or amateur, investigates a crime, often murder.-In ancient literature:...

.

Kurland's early career was devoted to works of science fiction. His first published novel was Ten Years to Doomsday (written with Chester Anderson

Chester Anderson

Chester Valentine John Anderson was a novelist, poet, and editor in the underground press. Raised in Florida, he attended the University of Miami from 1952 to 1956 before becoming a beatnik coffee house poet in Greenwich Village and San Francisco's North Beach...

) in 1964. Other notable works include Tomorrow Knight, Pluribus, Perchance, and The Unicorn Girl

The Unicorn Girl

The Unicorn Girl is a science fiction novel by Michael Kurland originally released in 1969.-Plot introduction:The novel is the second part of the Greenwich Village Trilogy, with Chester Anderson writing the first book and the third volume written by T.A...

. The Unicorn Girl was the middle volume of the Greenwich Village Trilogy by three different authors, the other two being Chester Anderson

Chester Anderson

Chester Valentine John Anderson was a novelist, poet, and editor in the underground press. Raised in Florida, he attended the University of Miami from 1952 to 1956 before becoming a beatnik coffee house poet in Greenwich Village and San Francisco's North Beach...

 and T.A. Waters

T.A. Waters

Thomas Alan Waters was an American magician, writer about magic, and science fiction author.-History:...

. (Anderson's book, The Butterfly Kid

The Butterfly Kid

The Butterfly Kid is a science fiction novel by Chester Anderson originally released in 1967. It was nominated for a Hugo Award for Best Novel in 1968. The novel is the first part of the Greenwich Village Trilogy, with Michael Kurland writing the second book and the third volume written by T.A...

, was nominated for a Hugo Award

Hugo Award

The Hugo Awards are given annually for the best science fiction or fantasy works and achievements of the previous year. The award is named after Hugo Gernsback, the founder of the pioneering science fiction magazine Amazing Stories, and was officially named the Science Fiction Achievement Awards...

).
Kurland has also written two novels, Ten Little Wizards and A Study in Sorcery, set in the world of Randall Garrett

Randall Garrett

Randall Garrett was an American science fiction and fantasy author. He was a prolific contributor to Astounding and other science fiction magazines of the 1950s and 1960s...

's Lord Darcy

Lord Darcy (fiction)

Lord Darcy is a detective in an alternate history, created by Randall Garrett. The first stories were asserted to take place in the same year as they were published, but in a world very different from our own.-Title character:...

, prefiguring his later success as a mystery writer.

Following the success of The Infernal Device, which was nominated for an Edgar Award

Edgar Award

The Edgar Allan Poe Awards , named after Edgar Allan Poe, are presented every year by the Mystery Writers of America...

 (as was his earlier A Plague of Spies), Kurland turned his attention to detective fiction. Several of his subsequent novels have been sequels to The Infernal Device, and feature Sherlock Holmes

Sherlock Holmes

Sherlock Holmes is a fictional detective created by Scottish author and physician Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The fantastic London-based "consulting detective", Holmes is famous for his astute logical reasoning, his ability to take almost any disguise, and his use of forensic science skills to solve...

's nemesis, Professor Moriarty

Professor Moriarty

Professor James Moriarty is a fictional character and the archenemy of the detective Sherlock Holmes in the fiction of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Moriarty is a criminal mastermind, described by Holmes as the "Napoleon of Crime". Doyle lifted the phrase from a real Scotland Yard inspector who was...

. In this series, Professor Moriarty is an antihero (and sometimes a real hero) who resignedly tolerates Holmes's obsessively exaggerated opinion of his criminal empire, and is often brought into reluctant alliance with his nemesis in order to counter menaces ranging from threats to their associates to threats to the nation.

He has edited three themed anthologies of Sherlock Holmes

Sherlock Holmes

Sherlock Holmes is a fictional detective created by Scottish author and physician Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The fantastic London-based "consulting detective", Holmes is famous for his astute logical reasoning, his ability to take almost any disguise, and his use of forensic science skills to solve...

 short stories, My Sherlock Holmes (stories narrated by characters other than Watson or Holmes), Sherlock Holmes: The Hidden Years (stories set during the period in which Holmes was supposed to be dead) and Sherlock Holmes: the American Years (stories set in the time between Holmes' graduation from university and his meeting Dr. Watson).

He is also the author of numerous non-fiction works, including How to Solve a Murder: the Forensic Handbook and How to Try a Murder: the Handbook for Armchair Lawyers.

Michael Kurland lives in Petaluma, California

Petaluma, California

Petaluma is a city in Sonoma County, California, in the United States. In the 2010 Census the population was 57,941.Located in Petaluma is the Rancho Petaluma Adobe, a National Historic Landmark. It was built beginning in 1836 by General Mariano Guadalupe Vallejo, then Commandant of the San...

.

Professor Moriarty series

• The Infernal Device (1978); reprinted in The Infernal Device and others
• Death by Gaslight (1982); reprinted in The Infernal Device and others
• "The Paradol Paradox" (in The Infernal Device and others, 2001)
• The Great Game (2001)
• "Years Ago and in a Different Place" (in My Sherlock Holmes, 2003)
• "Reichenbach" (in Sherlock Holmes: The Hidden Years, 2004)
• The Empress of India (2006)

Lord Darcy

Lord Darcy (fiction)

Lord Darcy is a detective in an alternate history, created by Randall Garrett. The first stories were asserted to take place in the same year as they were published, but in a world very different from our own.-Title character:...

 series

• Ten Little Wizards (1988)
• A Study in Sorcery (1989)

Alexander Brass series

• Too Soon Dead
• The Girls in the High-Heeled Shoes
• "He Couldn't Fly" (in The Mammoth Book of Roaring Twenties Whodunnits)

War Incorporated series

• Mission: Third Force
• Mission: Tank War
• A Plague of Spies

Science fiction

• Ten Years to Doomsday (with Chester Anderson) (1964)
• The Unicorn Girl
  The Unicorn Girl
  The Unicorn Girl is a science fiction novel by Michael Kurland originally released in 1969.-Plot introduction:The novel is the second part of the Greenwich Village Trilogy, with Chester Anderson writing the first book and the third volume written by T.A...
  
  (1969)
• Transmission Error (1970)
• Pluribus (1975)
• The Whenabouts of Burr (1975)
• Tomorrow Knight (1976)
• The Princes of Earth (Young Adult) (1978)
• The Last President (S. W. Barton) (1980)
• Psi Hunt (1980)
• First Cycle (posthumous editing and expanding of a manuscript by H. Beam Piper) (1982)
• Star Griffin (1987)
• Perchance (1989)
• Button Bright (1990)

Anthologies (as editor)

• My Sherlock Holmes: Untold Stories of the Great Detective (2003)
• Sherlock Holmes: The Hidden Years (2004)
• Sherlock Holmes: The American Years (2010)

Short stories

• "Elementary" (with Laurence M. Janifer) (1964)
• "Bond of Brothers" (1965)
• "Please State My Business" (1965)
• "Fimbulsommer" (with Randall Garrett) (1970)
• "Small World" (1973)
• "Think Only This of Me" (1973)
• "A Brief Dance to the Music of the Spheres" (1983)
• "In the Blood" (1995)
• "The Rite Stuff" (2004)
• "Four Hundred Slaves" (2005)

Nonfiction

• The Spymaster's Handbook (1988)
• A Gallery of Rogues: Portraits in True Crime (1994)
• How to Solve a Murder: The Forensic Handbook (1995)
• How to Try a Murder: The Handbook for Armchair Lawyers (1997)
• Irrefutable Evidence -- Adventures in the History of Forensic Science (2009)

External links

• Author's Home Page