As a young woman, Marie Benedict was gifted a book by a treasured aunt—who also happened to be an English professor—that opened her eyes to the hidden world of women’s stories and voices that lurked in the shadows of the past. The epiphany she experienced while immersed in this particular book, The Mists of Avalon, is one she hopes to share with the readers of her own books, as she unearths important but unknown, historical women from the detritus of the past and brings them into the light of modern-day where their very contemporary contributions and issues can be explored.

Marie's route to authorship was circuitous—involving a decade as a commercial litigator in New York City and failed aspirations at becoming an archaeologist—but now that she’s arrived, she is wasting no time in writing her narratively connected series of historical novels, that began with The Other Einstein, the story of Einstein's first wife, a physicist who made important contributions to his theories, continued with Carnegie’s Maid, the tale of an Irish immigrant woman who influenced Carnegie's transformation into the founder of free libraries, and persists with The Only Woman In The Room, the story of the brilliant inventor Hedy Lamarr.

Lady Clementine (Jan 2020) is the story of the incredible Clementine Churchill and was an instant international bestseller. Her next novel, The Mystery of Mrs. Christie was published in January of 2021, and her first co-written book, The Personal Librarian, with the talented Victoria Christopher Murray, in June of 2021. Her latest novel, Her Hidden Genius, was published in January 2022. Coming in January, 2023 will be The Mitford Affair.

Marie, a magna cum laude graduate of Boston College and a cum laude graduate from the Boston University School of Law after which she practiced as a commercial litigator in New York City for a decade, lives in Pittsburgh with her family. Writing as Heather Terrell, Marie also published the historical novels The Chrysalis, The Map Thief, and Brigid of Kildare.