Isabella (preferably Bella) Marie Swan is the daughter of Charlie Swan of Forks, Washington and Renee Dwyer of Phoenix, Arizona and later Jacksonville, Florida. Her parents were married right out of high school and had Bella at a very young age. Charlie and Renee later divorced, and Renee moved to Phoenix, Arizona, due to not being able to stand living in dreary, constantly overcast Forks any longer, taking newborn Bella with her. Every summer Bella would come and visit her father for a few weeks in the little cloudy town of Forks where her parents had lived.

Bella stopped going to Forks when she was a young teen because she did not like it there. When Renee married Phil, Bella felt she was holding her mom back from being able to travel with her baseball playing husband, so she decided to move to Forks to live with Charlie so her mom could be happy. This is just one of many selfless acts demonstrated by Bella, which is part of her character.

This is where she met and fell deeply in love with Edward Cullen. After discovering the secret of Edward and his family, her life changed dramatically as they grow ever more attached to one another. Bella, being known to attract disasters, constantly keeps Edward busy saving her life from day to day events. later she finds out that her best friend jacob black is a shapeshifting werewolf and is torn between her love for edward and her friendship with jacob.

Bella is described as being very fair-skinned with dark brown hair and chocolate brown eyes and a heart-shaped face. She has a wide forehead, large, wide-spaced, doe-like eyes, and prominent cheekbones. She is 5'4' , but not muscular, and weighs 110 pounds. She does not think of herself as beautiful, but she is alone in this opinion.