In A Rebellious Woman, my novel based on the life of Belle Boyd, I include chapters written from the point of view of Eliza, the enslaved woman who cared for her. …

Claire Griffin

Belle Boyd’s first experience of the war happened on July 2, 1861 when the Battle of Hoke’s Run was fought within ten miles of her home in Martinsburg, Virginia. This excerpt describes the way I imagined her experience that day. “Grandmother ordered Eliza to close the windows and lower the…

First chapters have to accomplish so much. You need to introduce your main character, establish your voice, set a tone. In historical fiction you have to evoke the time period in a believable way, with details that enhance the story without slowing it down. I find Belle fascinating, and I…

In A Rebellious Woman, Belle’s story is interwoven with the perspective of Eliza, the enslaved woman who has cared for her since birth. In this excerpt, Belle has just given Eliza a book which she is showing to her husband, Sam. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ “Eliza reached into her pocket and handed Sam…

After the Battle of Bull Run (Manassas), Belle spent several months working in a military hospital. She was seventeen at the time. This horrifying experience strengthened her resolve to help “Our Boys”. Later on, she came to realize that there were “boys” on both sides of the conflict. “Late in…

“The danger to Belle increased when the retreating Union soldiers spotted her. Before, she had been in danger from cross-fire. Now she was their target. They began aiming for the small figure in the white bonnet zigzagging across the fields like a frightened rabbit. She had to keep running, hearing…

Note: I’ve already described some of Belle Boyd’s badass credentials: wearing men’s clothing, riding astride, pulling a knife on a soldier in a Confederate camp and starting a riot. This autobiographical piece details some of my own badassedness. ~~~~~ An Interesting Death We’d been warned about scorpions. That they’re everywhere in the desert…

Discovery: When you write fiction based on the life of an actual person, you can’t always choose what you write about. This was something I didn’t anticipate when I began working on REBELLIOUS HEART. After all one of the great things about fiction is that the writer gets to decide…