It is the first Wednesday of the month, time to check in with my friends at the Insecure Writers Support Group (IWSG)…….and address their question of the day.

Whose perspective do you write from…..the hero (protagonist) or the villain (antagonist), and why?

To begin with, the protagonist in my stories is rarely a hero (or shero) in the generally accepted sense of the word. In my October Years books the hero I depict will be sixty or seventy years old ……tired, a bit worn down, and struggling in the face of one or more late-life challenges.

With few exceptions the antagonist confronting my hero will not wear a human face, but rather a situational disguise such as……late-life relational possibilities, confining health issues, distressing financial realities, incompatible retirement agendas, and the like.

The stories that emerge from that unlikely blend of ingredients will follow my equally unlikely heroes as they cope with their challenges. Though they will seldom overcome those existential obstacles, they will carry on, wringing the best and most they can from a bad situation……continuing to Become, unwilling to settle for less.

Since those October Years protagonists, the ones that pass as heroes in my stories, are literally my peers, it is only natural the I tell my tale from their perspective. They may not always be the good guys, but they are always my guys.