The news first manifested as rumor. John D. Haefele heard that Will Murray had died. Didn’t want to believe it. Tom Krabacher, who chatted with Will only a couple of weeks ago during PulpFest, thought the idea might have come about because a little-known actor of that name passed away. Perhaps the recent internet “Bill Murray death hoax” might have accidentally snagged Will’s sleeve and tugged him along for a minute.
But it is true. Will Murray died on August 24, 2026. The obit by William Lampkin — editor of The Pulpster for PulpFest — provides a link to the formal funeral home eulogy.
I corresponded with Will casually, from 1991 on, and saw him holding down his table the few times I attended PulpFest. Will, Krabacher and I sat in on a panel about editing Weird Tales. Most memorably, he contacted me when he was in San Francisco for a conference and we got together after nightfall so I could show him the Hammett sites. Best of all, the late great Bill Arney was home in Sam Spade’s apartment that evening, so Will got a chance to visit the sanctum sanctorum.
Will was thoroughly conversant in Hammett, of course. I said it here and I’ll say it again now: his discovery that the story “The Diamond Wager” was not written by Hammett was a major coup in Hammett Studies, and a boon to fans like me who always thought that story sucked eggs. Cut it off the list, as fast as possible.
His history of the Western pulp magazines is a masterpiece. His scholarship in Lovecraft, primo. His coverage of such pulp heroes as Doc Savage and The Shadow, what can you say? The standard.
And then you have his long career as a neo-pulp writer, from ghosting The Destroyer paperbacks under a house name before taking on Doc Savage with his first Doc adventure, Python Isle, and assuming the house name Kenneth Robeson. More recently he has taken Tarzan to Mars to swashbuckle with John Carter, had Doc face off against King Kong, and more — much more.
I don’t know if you could just say, flat-out, that Will Murray stands as the greatest of the neo-pulp writers. Philip Jose Farmer did his bit, too, though for sheer pulp production numbers, Will’s output smokes him. And a writing team such as Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child can’t be ignored — neo-pulp for sure, but using their own variations of the form and reaching bestseller status.
Depends on how you calculate it, I guess. But I don’t think you can leave Will Murray’s life work out of that calculation. Top ten? Hell. Top five, at least.
My favorite Will moment was when he mentioned in an author’s bio that he had developed the first documented case of “pulp lung.” With his house filled with pulps, with the brittle edges of the wood pulp paper breaking off and drifting around like dust in a coal mine, with a lifetime hands-on with those mags and the literature they spawned — what imagery.
No one else came close to having a case of pulp lung anything like Will Murray. R.I.P.
