Red is an easy character for me to relate to. He’s a tough old marine who has been dealt a crappy hand in life. His wife of many years passed away about fifteen years before Faded Grace happens. She was a good woman who surprised him in many ways. A prime example was when she agreed to marry him after he returned from serving in Afghanistan. She had to set him straight on what was important to her, and he was agreeable to the terms of surrender.
She passed away from an engineered virus unleashed on the American continent a month before an all-out attack by Communist China, late in 2029.
Red had been recalled to active duty to fight off a “peacekeeping” action into North America by the United Nations, which had taken it upon itself to try and “secure” American nuclear weapons during the political upheaval after the 2028 elections.
Both of those events triggered the Second American Civil War, which ultimately led to the dissolution of the United States of America, along with a host of other negative outcomes worldwide.
Fast-forward to 2043, and we find the post-war Reds’ coping method is coffee and beer. Things get interesting when a neighbor entrusts Red to babysit her son, Chase. He is forced to come to terms with the idea that he could possibly be the world's worst babysitter. The savvy kid plays him like a fiddle and wins his affection to the point that there is little Red would not do for him.
Between Red, Christine (another character I posted about last week), Chase, and others, the Wandering Breezes Trailer Park in Applegate, Michigan, could be referred to as Dysfunction Junction.
Where do you draw inspiration from when developing characters?
