Will Murray

William Patrick Murray, known professionally as Will Murray, was an American novelist, journalist, short-story writer, comic-book writer, and one of the pulp community's foremost historians. He was born on 28 April 1953 and grew up in the Jamaica Plain neighborhood of Boston before the family moved to North Quincy in 1969. He graduated from North Quincy High School in June 1971 and later earned a bachelor's degree summa cum laude in English from the University of Massachusetts Boston. As a boy he loved Marvel comics, especially Spider-Man; in his teens he discovered Doc Savage and The Shadow, began collecting pulps, and never looked back.

Murray entered the field as a fan writer and editor. He contributed psychological profiles and articles to Doc Savage fanzines, edited Duende (c. 1975-1977) and Skullduggery, joined pulp-reprint house Odyssey Publications, and co-authored The Duende History of The Shadow Magazine (1980), later cited among Universal's research materials for the Shadow film. Circa 1978, while visiting Lester Dent's home in La Plata, Missouri, he found the outline for an unwritten Doc Savage story, Python Isle. Friendship with Dent's widow, Norma, led to Murray becoming literary executor / agent for the Dent estate from about 1979. Bantam eventually published Python Isle (1991) under Dent's house name Kenneth Robeson, launching more than twenty new Doc Savage novels from Dent outlines and related material. His Wild Adventures of Doc Savage novel Skull Island (pairing Doc with King Kong) won the 2014 Pulp Factory Award for Best Novel. He later wrote authorized Wild Adventures of Pat Savage, The Spider, Tarzan (including Return to Pal-ul-don, King Kong vs. Tarzan, and Mars crossovers), Sherlock Holmes collections, and Cthulhu Mythos volumes for Altus / Odyssey / Adventures in Bronze.

Separately, after interviewing Destroyer co-creators Warren Murphy and Richard Sapir for Skullduggery and doing research work, Murray edited The Assassin's Handbook (1982) and ghostwrote The Destroyer, beginning with Encounter Group (#56) and then regularly from Blood Ties (#69) through Feast or Famine (#107). For Marvel he scripted Destroyer magazine stories and co-created Squirrel Girl (Doreen Green) with Steve Ditko in Marvel Super-Heroes (Winter 1991 / vol. 2 #8), "The Coming of ... Squirrel Girl." Family and interview sources say he based the character on close friend / former girlfriend Doreen Greeley (or "Doreen"), who loved animals; Ditko invented the knuckle spike. The character later became a cult and mainstream Marvel favorite via Dan Slott's Great Lakes Avengers and Ryan North and Erica Henderson's Unbeatable Squirrel Girl. Murray returned for anniversary/special stories in Unbeatable Squirrel Girl #16 and Marvel Comics #1001. He also wrote the prose novel Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D.: Empyre (2000). As a Starlog contributing editor he covered film productions worldwide. With S. T. Joshi and Jon L. Cooke he helped organize Friends of H. P. Lovecraft, which placed a memorial plaque at Brown University's John Hay Library in August 1990. He adapted Doc Savage for NPR radio and produced pulp audio/ebook lines for Radio Archives.

Awards included the Lamont Award (1979), Comic Book Marketplace research excellence (1999), Pulp Ark Best Series Revival (2011), Pulp Factory Best Novel for Skull Island (2014), Golden Lion Award for Edgar Rice Burroughs contributions (2021), and First Fandom Hall of Fame (2023). He was a PulpFest fixture for decades (guest of honor 2013); his last appearance was 1 August 2026 on the panel "Working With Licensed Characters." Away from pulp and comics he explored Tarot, mediumship, and remote viewing, and published the metaphysical ebook Forever After (2016) under William Patrick Murray.

Will Murray of Quincy passed away suddenly on 25 August 2026, aged 73, according to the Keohane Funeral Home family obituary (sister Mary Power of North Quincy surviving; parents Patrick and Maureen (Teahan) Murray and brother Daniel predeceased). Wikipedia and several trade outlets date the death 24 August 2026; this profile uses the family date and records the one-day variance. Cause of death was not made public. Services were private. In lieu of flowers, donations were requested for World Central Kitchen. Matt Moring of Steeger Books announced the death to the pulp community on Facebook; Marvel Entertainment posted an official social tribute around 31 August 2026; Mark Evanier memorialized him on News From ME.