The Fourth of July

Bel Mooney (born 1946) is an English journalist and broadcaster. She was born in Liverpool, and spent her earliest years on a council estate; in 1969 Mooney became a journalist, and later went on to write for the New Statesman, the Daily Telegraph Magazine, Cosmopolitan and many others. She was also a columnist on the Daily Mirror, The Times and The Sunday Times. Having made her name as a journalist, columnist, and broadcaster, Mooney turned her hand to writing fiction for adults and children. She has published 26 books for children and young people, and her fiction (adults and children) has been translated into eleven languages. Her children's novel The Voices of Silence won a New York Public Library citation and was shortlisted for a Gold Medal in the State of California.

Mooney holds honorary degrees from the University of Bath and Liverpool John Moores University, and is a Fellow of University College London. She has reviewed fiction and non-fiction for many newspapers including the Spectator, the Observer, The Times and the Times Literary Supplement. She has also been a judge for the Whitbread (now Costa) Book of the Year and The Orange Prize.