Best interview question you ever received?

[Milena]

Hello, all! I am new around here, although I am on Goodreads for ten years now. I have a site for books and reading (it is Bulgarian, but we cover worldwide news and stories) and I love doing interviews with authors but I often struggle with creating original questions. It is particularly difficult when the author is quite popular - I feel like everyone out there is asking the same questions over and over again. I always try to read the book/s before writing down the questions. So help a girl out and give me the best questions you were ever asked by an interviewer or a reader. Thank you all! :)

[Pamela]

Some interviewers stick to the same list of questions. I prefer to have a shorter basic list and add some specifics. For example, John A Heldt writes time travel stories and researches the history of the period he is writing about (events, people etc). When I interviewed John I asked him about his research.

Try to think about what YOU want to know for example how they get their inspiration for a book or the author's quirks when writing. This will probably be in line with what your own followers/readers want to know.

You may even like to ask questions other authors/writers would be interested in such as how they go about marketing.

Don't be afraid to ask popular authors for an interview. They too need to publicise their books but keep the questions straight forward. How this helps a little bit.