#ThisorThatThursday Author Interview with Michelle Bennington

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Things you never want to run out of: toilet paper, coffee

Things you wish you’d never bought: the vitamins and supplements I always forget to take

A few of your favorite things: Christmas with my mom, chocolate, coffee, my husband, and my dog

Things you need to throw out: old clothes I’ve had since college, old plastic containers that no longer have matching lids, expired food in the fridge

Things you need for your writing sessions: laptop, TV show (Monk, Dateline, or Great British Baking show, or music to fit the mood)

Things that hamper your writing: people talking (I know it doesn’t make sense. I can ignore voices on TV, but not actual people), noisy neighbors

Hardest thing about being a writer: balancing the rest of my life around a writing schedule, revision

Easiest thing about being a writer: coming up with ideas

Favorite foods: bacon, cheeseburgers, BBQ chicken pizza, fruit

Things that make you want to gag: raw fish, sea urchin, hominy

Favorite music or song:

Music that drives you crazy:

Favorite beverage: coffee, Ale-8-1, apple crisp oat milk macchiato at Starbucks

Something that gives you a sour face: many herbal teas—they sometimes taste like licorice or dirt

Favorite smell: cooking bacon, perking coffee, honeysuckle, lilac

Something that makes you hold your nose: gasoline, car exhaust, cigarettes

Something you’re really good at: making scones

Something you’re really bad at: sticking to a diet / exercise plan

Last best thing you ate: BBQ sandwhich, and chicken BBQ pizza

Last thing you regret eating: The communal chocolate at work. It apparently had been sitting in someone’s car for the whole summer.

Things you’d walk a mile for: A historical site I want to see (I’ve actually walked a mile a few times to do that in England and Scotland, but didn’t really have a choice)

Things that make you want to run screaming from the room: vocal fry, ending statements with a question, people scraping their teeth on their silverware as they eat

Favorite places you’ve been: Scotland, England

Places you never want to go to again: DMV, any store on Black Friday

Favorite books (or genre): historical fiction, classic fiction, general fiction, biographies, true history, true crime, mystery, some romance, some poetry, psych thriller (if not too violent or gory)—there’s really so many books I love and so many authors. I can’t possibly name them all!

Books you wouldn’t buy: typcially not a fan of Sci-Fi, most fantasy, most horror, most westerns, most paranormal, most YA, occult, all sports.

About Michelle:

Born and raised in the beautiful Bluegrass state of Kentucky, Michelle Bennington developed a passion for books early on that has since progressed into a mild hoarding situation and an ever-growing to-read pile. She delights in transporting readers into worlds of mystery, both contemporary and historical.

 In rare moments of spare time, she can be found engaging in a wide array of arts and crafts, reading, traveling, and attending tours involving ghosts, historical sites, or distilleries.

#WriterWednesday with Author Michelle Bennington

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I’d like to welcome author Michelle Bennington to the blog this week for #WriterWednesday!

Hardest thing about being a writer: Revision, marketing, and social media.

Easiest thing about being a writer: Coming up with ideas and the first draft.

Favorite foods: (this is a list that could on forever) Fresh baked scone, bacon, chocolate truffles, anything with caramel, my mom’s fried chicken, cold watermelon on a hot summer day, my grandma’s fried apple pies and homemade apple butter, apple pie, and spice cake.

Things that make you want to gag: I like a lot of ethnic and sea foods, but sea urchin and sashimi are two things I’ll never eat again. Oysters in any form, hominy, and okra. Chocolate above 70% dark.

Favorite music or song: (This is a list that could on forever, too). I like a wide range of pop, rock, hip hop, blues, some rap, wide array of international music, country, some punk, bluegrass, metal, classical, and religious hymns. My tastes are really eclectic. I think above all these is Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata. One of the most beautiful pieces ever written. And I love anything played on the cello.

Music that drives you crazy: anything that I feel lacks artistry, meaning, or soul.

Favorite beverage: coffee, Earl Grey tea, Ale-8 (a Kentucky citrus-ginger soda), chai.

Something that gives you a sour face: black coffee. I have to have a little cream. Buttermilk. Plain Kefir.

Favorite smell: honeysuckle on a warm summer night, cooking bacon, brewing coffee, sandalwood, lavender.

Something that makes you hold your nose: the smell of gasoline, diesel, mildew, car exhaust, mold, cigarette smoke.

Something you’re really good at: Though I’m pretty good at cooking and baking in general, I’m best at making scones and bourbon balls and other holiday treats.

Something you’re really bad at: math

Something you like to do: Dance. I’m a member of a Middle Eastern dance troupe and I teach Bollywood dance. Play board and card games with my friends. It’s one of the most special things I do all year.

Something you wish you’d never done: Procrastinating on writing that first novel and launching my writing career. But I felt like there was so much I didn’t know and didn’t know how to find out. It’s been a journey for sure.

Favorite places you’ve been: Scotland

Places you never want to go to again: I can’t say there’s no place I’d want to revisit because even the rough, unsavory, or “bad” places were a learning experience that taught me something very valuable about life, the world, and myself. However, there have been some rough hotels/motels/B&Bs I’m happy to never step foot in again.

Favorite books (or genre): (another list that could go on forever). I like a wide variety of genres and books but tend to stay around mystery, historical fiction, biography, non-fiction history, poetry, thrillers, true crime. Occasionally, I’ll stray into horror, fantasy, romance, or paranormal.

Books you wouldn’t buy: YA, Sci-fi, erotica, children’s, most fantasy, most paranormal, most horror, most poetry, sports-based fiction and non-fiction.

Favorite things to do: Try new things, go to new places. I like to dance, travel, do historical tours, have afternoon tea, read in a bubble bath, go to the beach or lake, hang out with friends.

Things you’d run through a fire or eat bugs to get out of doing: taxes, deal with an insurance issue or technological / appliance issues.

Things that make you happy: My family, my dog (Maple), writing, reading, traveling (as long as I’m not driving), dancing, art, crafts.

Things that drive you crazy: Traffic. Computers. Spam. Noisy neighbors. People who lack intellectual curiosity or intellectual humility. Laziness.

About Michelle:

Born and raised in the beautiful Bluegrass state of Kentucky, Michelle Bennington developed a passion for books early on that has since progressed into a mild hoarding situation and an ever-growing to-read pile. She delights in transporting readers into worlds of mystery, both contemporary and historical.

In rare moments of spare time, she can be found engaging in a wide array of arts and crafts, reading, dance, traveling, and attending tours involving ghosts, historical homes, or distilleries.

Find out more about her series at www.michellebennington.com

The Small-Batch Mysteries: set in contemporary Kentucky, in the bourbon community (Level Best Books).

The Hazardous Hoarder Mysteries: set in contemporary Kentucky, featuring amateur hoarder-turned-sleuth, Birdie Harper.

The Widows & Shadows series: a historical mystery series set in late Georgian England to release October 2023 (Level Best Books).

A Sampling of Sleuths: Discover A New Binge-Worthy Mystery Series Anthology to release June 20, 2023 (Thalia Press).

Michelle loves talking about books, reading, writing, and history so y’all stop by for a visit anytime!

Let’s Be Social:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/michellebenningtonauthor

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/michelle.bennington.author/

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/?ref=nav_home