Despite her concerns about sounding showy-offy that’s the last thing Susanna Bavin is. She may be the quietest of the Sister Scribes, the most softly spoken, but that does nothing to hide her keen intellect and enquiring mind. Most definitely her own woman.

There is something scary about being asked to introduce yourself on a magazine page. Will it sound showy-offy? But my fellow Sister Scribes have all introduced themselves, so now it’s my turn. Here goes.

I am living proof that dreams come true. There! How’s that for showy-offy? Not to mention being rather a grand claim. But it’s the simple truth. As a child, I dreamed of one day living in North Wales – Llandudno, to be precise – and six years ago, my husband and I found a beautiful house here, threw caution and jobs to the winds, and moved here. Best thing we ever did. One question we get asked by people who would love to live here (it seems that almost everybody who comes here on holiday dreams of living here) is, “Is it different when you live here? Less special?” and the answer to that is a resounding No. We love it just as much, if not more, and that feeling of “Wow! We really live here” has never gone away.

So that’s one dream. The other, of course, is that I have finally become a published writer. I say ‘finally’ because, although I was a child-writer and have been writing all my life, for most of that time I didn’t submit anything to literary agents. As a matter of fact, I got rather hooked on getting feedback and worked with a writers’ advisory service for some years. Then I decided to aim for publication, so I joined the RNA (Romantic Novelists’ Association) with the intention of writing four books, so as to have a body of work to offer a literary agent.

In the event, after I had written three, I became aware of other new writers getting their books published, which made me feel left behind, so I decided that the size of my body of work was perfectly adequate at three books and started submitting to literary agents. I was lucky enough to be signed up by Laura Longrigg at MBA.

The books I write are sagas. To date, I have had three published – The Deserter’s Daughter, A Respectable Woman and The Sewing Room Girl. The fourth, The Poor Relation, follows in May. The books are set in the part of Manchester where my family has lived for several generations and where I grew up.

I was a saga writer before I knew what sagas were. As a teenager, I lapped up Victoria Holt’s novels and started writing gothic stories, but these naturally grew and became what I later found out were sagas. For me, this was just the natural development of my writing style. I was delighted when, as a reader, I found out that other people wrote this kind of story too!

What do I like about sagas? The historical setting, for starters. I love to see the characters having to tackle their problems within the social and legal context of the time. I also enjoy the glimpse of social history, which is a great interest of mine. Clothes, meals, furniture – I love all those domestic details especially costume. It’s no coincidence that my forthcoming book, The Sewing Room Girl, involves the making of lots of clothes!

Follow Susanna on Twitter @SusannaBavin