Author Interview: Mark E. Benjamin

Since I began featuring author interviews on my blog in January, the response has been far more enthusiastic than I had anticipated.  What was intended as a monthly entry quickly became semi-monthly as I reached out to more authors and in turn, more authors reached out to me with requests to be interviewed.  

Once in awhile, it's a pleasure when I can go to a party and chat up a fellow local author.  Today, we welcome  Mark Benjamin who paired his deep Christian faith with his love of history, adventure, and fantasy to produce his first novel, Passing Through Lightning.  

1.      First, let us know where we can find you online such as blogs, websites, Facebook, etc.

Book: Facebook: "Passing Through Lightning" --- Website: http://ptl.voydphil.org/

                Ministry:  Facebook: “VoydPhil” --- Website: http://www.voydphil.org/index.html

 

2.       Are there any particular writers who inspired or influenced you? What genres do you enjoy reading?

Frank Peretti

J.R.R. Tolkien

Alex Haley

 

Adventure fantasy, mystery, historical.

 

 

3.       Your first novel, Passing Through Lightning  (Xulon Press, 2006) is a Christian themed tale set both in modern day and Civil War era, with a protagonist that travels in time between the two.      

 

 

What inspired the story?

 

As far as the setting, my fascination for the Civil War time period and also personal family (ancestors) involvement in the Civil War and in the military in general.
 

As far as storyline and points that I try to get across, it is from observation of situations and struggles in mine and others' lives. There are many times we need to look back to be able to face the future and scrutinize what lies ahead of us in order to comprehend our past. Passing Through Lightning does that in many ways.

 

 

How much research was involved to depict that time in America’s history?    Is that a subject in which you had expertise before you wrote the novel?

 

I have a personal family connection to each war in America’s history with quite a few ancestors of mine being in the Civil War. The most iconic being 6 generations back (my 4Great-Grandfather) Brigadier General James Nagle – who happens to have a statue at the Antietam battlefield. I have always been interested in and a student of history, but when you have relatives that were helping to make it, you tend to have an even higher interest in the subject.
 

Even though Passing Through Lightning is a historical “fiction”, you still do need to get the history part as close to real events as possible, so there was certainly additional research needed. Mostly done as I wrote and I came up against issues that needed to be just right or clarified I would look up those facts. 

 

4.       Can we expect any future books from you?

 

The Lord willing – yes.  I have a first draft done on another book. It has to do with Spiritual and Physical warfare and how it is sometimes difficult to tell who is on what side, especially when they are so intertwined with each other. Plus I have notes on several other books I would like to write.

 
 

 

5.       What does Mark Benjamin do when he isn’t writing?   

 

Keeping up with a wife and five kids is a good place to start.

 

Working on furthering alone VoydPhil. Besides the PR and face-to-face type stuff, there is a lot of research and writing that is put in to VoydPhil. Between publishing newsletters, commentating on news events, articles and correspondence, there is more here to do than there is time to do it in.
 

VoydPhil’s purpose is to better educate Christians in their Jewish background so as to not only give them a deeper understanding of their own religion but to provide for a better connection to their Jewish cousins so as to present the optimum situation for witnessing and a higher success in bring the Jews to know their Messiah – Jesus.

 

Genealogy – it’s the ultimate mystery.

 

And then the biggest interruption – my full time job in computers.