Michael Scott Curnes is a multi-award-winning Canadian novelist living in Victoria, British Columbia, CANADA. He is a member of The Writers’ Union of Canada.

Simpleman (September 1, 2025) is the sixth Michael Scott Curnes novel to be published. Simpleman is a memoir to a period in rural America encompassing 1946-2025. This is a story about living and growing up rural and gay, and it includes aspects of adolescent sexuality, as well as instances of incest, rape and suicide that may not be suitable for all readers.

[This story, while fictional, is based on actual events. In certain cases, incidents, characters, names, and timeline have been changed for dramatic purposes. Certain characters may be composites or entirely fictious. This story is created for entertainment purposes. Opinions, acts, and statements attributed to any entity, individual or individuals may have been fabricated or exaggerated for effect. The opinions and fictionalized depictions of individuals, group and entities, and any statement contained herein, are not to be relied upon in any way]. 

To Pay Paul (July 1, 2022) marks the 10th fiction novel written by this author and his fifth to be published. Considered a sequel to his Green Book Award-winning novel, For the Love of Mother (2011), this latest work marks a return to the eco-thriller genre and a reoccurring character: the mightily dammed Columbia River. Written as an ode to the many cancer victims and survivors who worked at, lived near or got contaminated downwind from the Hanford Nuclear Site in East-Central Washington State–among whom, Curnes considers himself a cancer-surviving Downwinder. Critics are hailing To Pay Paul as an eco-thriller 17 Million years in the making. Winner of the 2022 Royal Dragonfly Award taking FIRST PRIZE in the Fiction, Green Books/Environmental and LGBTQ categories. To Pay Paul was also the 2022-23 Bronze Medal Winner in the Reader Views Literary Awards. Download a short sheet here.

Wicked Ninnish (2020) his fourth published novel was loosely derived from the author’s experiences living in Clayoquot Sound from the mid-Nineties to the mid-Oughts—when and where he designed and built an off-the-grid cabin on Wickaninnish Island while managing an oceanfront resort, helming the local chamber of commerce, and running two Bed-and-Breakfasts. Wicked Ninnish picked up the Royal Dragonfly Literary Awards LGBTQ Fiction Prize, the Readers View Reviewers Choice Award Bronze Medal for LGBTQ Fiction, and was a Legacy Fiction Finalist in the 19th Annual American Book Fest Best Book Awards.

Coping with Ash (2017) his third published novel was based on the author’s own scheme for the eventual distribution of his human cremains (ashes). Coping with Ash earned the 2017 New Apple Book Award for Best LGBTQ Fiction, The Royal Dragonfly Literary Book Award for Best LGBTQ Fiction, a Bronze Medal for LGBTQ Fiction in the Independent Book Publishers Awards, was a 2017 Finalist in the International Book Awards, and received an Honorable Mention in the 2017 Great Northwest Book Festival.

For the Love of Mother (2011) his 2nd published novel was the author’s first eco-thriller  and the winner of the 2011 Green Book Awards Fiction prize in 2011. (Margaret Atwood’s The Year of the Flood was the previous year’s winner of this prize). For the Love of Mother was also named a fiction finalist in the 2011 International Books Festival.

VAL (1996) his debut fiction novel, published by Brownell & Carroll, is based on the short life of Silent Film legend, Rudolph Valentino. 

The author attests that neither Artificial Intelligence (AI) nor Chat GPT are utilized in the creation and writing of his novels which are all original works of fiction based on events and people both real and imagined. In instances where real people intersect in a blend of actual and fictionalized events, real people’s names have been mostly altered. In the interest of preserving historical accuracy, the author has made the decision to include the actual names of artists, celebrities and elected politicians involved in publicly released works, specific government proceedings or historical events when these associations are already deemed to be part of the public record.

More about Michael

Born in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho in 1962 and raised in north-central Idaho and western Montana, Curnes grew up listening to, interpreting and telling stories. After high school, he toured the U.S. and Europe for a year performing as a singer and dancer in the Up with People Show before settling into more formal studies at the universities of Idaho and then New Mexico.

After university, Michael managed hotels for Holiday Inns in New Mexico and Colorado, and the Westin Hotel in the New Orleans French Quarter. He switched careers during the AIDS Crisis and worked as the Director of Volunteers for the Colorado AIDS Project in Denver and the Community AIDS Services Unit for the Seattle-King County Department of Public Health in Seattle. He returned to hospitality in the late ’90s to manage an ocean-front resort in Tofino, British Columbia, and during this stint, made the decision to immigrate to Canada, becoming a Canadian Citizen on Valentine’s Day in the Year 2000. After working in a number of local government and not-for-profit/charity management and consulting positions, Michael retired in 2024.

His debut novel, VAL, was published in 1996 by Brownell and Carroll. Inkwater Press published his next three novels, For the Love of Mother [Fiction Prize Winner at the 2011 Green Book Awards in San Francisco]; Coping with Ash [Fiction Prize Winner in the 2017 New Apple Book Awards and Bronze Medal Prize in the Independent Book Publishers Awards]; followed by Wicked Ninnish [Fiction Prize Winner in the 2020 Royal Dragonfly Book Awards]. In 2022, his eco-thriller, To Pay Paul was published by Down Wind Press [2022 Royal Dragonfly triple prize winner for Best Fiction, Best LGBTQ Fiction and Best Environmental Fiction].

Michael is living his best life with his soulmate and husband—Bernard—on Vancouver Island in Victoria, British Columbia, CANADA.

Also by Michael Scott Curnes

In addition to his six published novels, Curnes has five complete works of unedited fiction that, so far, have not been published. These include his debut novel: A Change in Face (1987); Whitewash (1989);  A Dare to Weep (1995); He with the Most Toys (1996); and La Misa Saltando (2002); the latter, an ambitious work set in Venezuela and written in both English and Spanish.

His essays have been published in two anthologies: Writing the West Coast: In Love With Place (2008) and Living Artfully: Reflections from the Far West Coast (2012) and printed in the Facts and Arguments section of Canada’s national newspaper, The Globe and Mail (1996).

Curnes has also written two unproduced musicals: WEB, the Musical (1998) and Eik, a Musical Revue (2004). He has also written two screenplays for film, Sweepstake (2002) and Coping with Ash (2003) the latter, he converted to a successfully published fiction novel by the same title. In addition, Curnes penned a three-act stage play (workshopped but unproduced) titled Embracing the Epilogue (1997).

He has also written for The Globe and Mail, Times Colonist, Westerly News and Sound Magazine.

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