Q&A with Kimberly Belle

 

 

 

Kimberly Belle is the author of the new novel The Expat Affair. Her other novels include The Paris Widow. She lives in Atlanta and in Amsterdam.

 

Q: What inspired you to write The Expat Affair, and how did you create your characters Rayna and Willow?

 

A: The inspiration for The Expat Affair began ages ago, when I packed up my life and moved to the Netherlands. I became an expat overnight: excited, disoriented, and completely out of my element. Everything felt bewildering, from the language to the social customs to simple daily tasks like ordering food or answering the phone.

 

It’s an emotional whiplash that stayed with me long after I learned to navigate my adopted home.

 

Decades later, it became the foundation for both Rayna and Willow: two American women in different phases of their expat journey, but who have no other choice than to lean on each other to survive.

 

Q: How did your knowledge of Amsterdam affect the writing of this novel?

 

A: Living part-time in Amsterdam definitely shaped this story and helped bring the setting to life. In some ways, knowing the city’s rhythms and habits made writing The Expat Affair easier, but I also wanted to do the city justice. To capture not just how it looks but how it feels when it’s all still foreign and new.

 

I’ve been here for so long that I hardly notice the quirks anymore, and I really had to dig back into those memories of when I didn’t know how to buy a tram ticket or that I had to pack my own groceries at the store. All those old frustrations and insecurities are Rayna’s and Willow’s now.

Q: What do you think the novel says about the life of an expat?

 

A: I hope The Expat Affair highlights how being an expat can be both liberating and unsettling at the same time.

 

There’s a thrill in starting over somewhere new, where no one knows your past and reinvention feels possible, but that freedom also comes with a cost. You’re constantly navigating a world where the rules are different, the language isn’t yours, and even everyday tasks require effort and translation.

 

The novel taps into that emotional tightrope—how isolating it can be to live between cultures, and how that sense of disconnection can make you vulnerable in ways you don’t expect. Rayna and Willow are in different phases of their expat journey, but they both feel this deeply.

 

Q: The writer Ashley Winstead called the book “a glamorous, smart, and propulsive thriller that is as much about women finding their agency as it is a high-stakes international game of cat and mouse.” What do you think of that description?

 

A: I love that description. Ashley really nailed it. The Expat Affair is a high-stakes thriller filled with murder, missing diamonds, and danger lurking in every canal, but at its heart, it’s about two women reclaiming control of their lives in very different ways.

 

That blend of glamour and suspense is exactly what I was going for, so hearing Ashley frame it that way felt like she really saw the story for what it is.

 

Q: What are you working on now?

 

A: Book 3 in the Young Rich Widows series is currently being recorded and will be released on Audible later this summer. I’m also working on another co-authored story, which I can’t quite talk about yet but hope to be announcing soon.

 

And if that’s not enough, I’m hard at work on my next solo novel, a story about a couple facing infertility and how their choice of sperm donor spirals into a waking nightmare—because for the donor, fatherhood was never the endgame.

 

I’ll be talking a lot more about these upcoming stories on my socials, so make sure to follow me there for the latest.

 

Q: Anything else we should know?

 

A: Only that The Expat Affair is more than just a twisty thriller. It’s a story about reinvention, about how far you’ll go to protect yourself when there’s no one else around to do it, and what it really means to trust someone—especially when you’re not sure you can.

 

It’s also a bit of a love letter to Amsterdam, in all its moody, mysterious glory. If you’ve ever dreamed of running away to a new city, of starting over and trying to outrun your past...consider yourself warned.

 

--Interview with Deborah Kalb. Here's a previous Q&A with Kimberly Belle.