Currently Ms. Belle is writing a new historical fiction novel on Alfred the Great.

The novel she wrote about the Jacobite Rebellion is still awaiting a publisher.

• How many books have you written in all?
      Thirteen.
  
  
• Which is/are your favourite book/series of the ones you have written?
     I like the 'Wintercombe' quartet best, but they were all fun to do and to write.
  
  
• Which character that you have portrayed is most like you?
  Silence St. Barbe, I think. For a start, she's not stunningly beautiful! Also, I share her love  of gardening, animals and children, and she is the calm, wise person I would like to be.  She's much braver than I am, though!
  
  
• When did you become interested in historical fiction?
  I loved the Roman novels of Rosemary Sutcliff when I was a child: I think I was ten when I  first read 'The Eagle of the Ninth', which is a wonderful book. After that I was hooked!
  
  
• How long have you been writing novels?
  I wrote all sorts of things as a child - short and long stories, and poems - but the book  which eventually became 'The Moon in the Water' was begun when I was twelve or  thirteen.
  
  
• Do you have a job other than writing?
  I used to teach six-year-olds all day, and write for most of the night. Then I realised that  one job had to go, and it wasn't the writing.
  Now I'm toying with the idea of working in a library or bookshop for a few hours a week,  just to get me out of the house!
  
  
• Which country would you most like to visit that you haven’t already? Why?
  I've never been to Italy, and I would love to go - Florence, Venice, Rome, all those lovely  ancient buildings and wonderful works of art, I've seen them so often on books and TV,  never in real life. And the lovely Tuscan countryside with the tall cypresses like pencils,  dreaming in the sun.
  
  
• Have you ever written a children’s book?
  No, and I don't think I ever would unless I had a burning story to tell. A lot of people think  that writing for children is easier than for adults, and it isn't - it's much, much harder.
  
  
• If there was one period in English history that you could go back to and live for a month, when would that be?             
  A very hard one, this. I think most of all I would like to go back to Elizabethan London, and  drop in on a performance of 'Much Ado About Nothing' at the Globe. Or sit in on a coffee  house discussion with Addison and Steele. Or ride with Prince Rupert in a cavalry  skirmish. Or listen to Alfred planning the defeat of the Vikings.
  
  But I'm so very squeamish, I doubt I could last a week of awful smells and dubious  medicines, let alone a month!
  
  
• What is the greatest challenge you face as a writer?
  Producing a book which will not only satisfy myself and my readers, but also a publisher!