Character Profile: Elizabeth Abbot Kinkaid

Elizabeth, or Lizzie as she is called, is the heroine of W.t.W.W.Y.N.   I wanted to make Lizzie as normal as possible, meaning I didn't want her to be some heroic FBI agent out to stop the bad guy.  I pictured her as someone who was the victim in a plot bigger than her, so that she would be forced to confront major obstacles to get her life back.  

Here's some basic information: 

Lizzie is early-30's (around 32 or 33).  She has wild, curly red hair.  I pictured her hair as reflecting her own emotions.  When it's calm and controlled, she has her life in order, and when it takes over, she's lost control of who she is.  She's pretty average in height but way too skinny (a result of stress from the last 2 years of her life).  

Her History:

Lizzie grew up in Rose Lee, Colorado with her father and grandparents.  Her mother left the family when Lizzie was only 3 or 4, and Lizzie has rarely seen her since.  Her grandmother died when she was  a teen, and her father died of a heart attack when Lizzie was in college.  So, she really leans on her grandfather as the support system in her life.

She grew up with five close friends.  Nick Kinkaid (who she would grow up to marry), Tess (who would marry Dan), Dan Monroe (Nick's cousin), Russ, and Emerson "Em" Kinkaid (Nick's younger sister).  Her deepest friend was Em until she passed away from cancer when the girls were teens. 

All the loss in Lizzie's past, especially the loss of Em, pushed her into the field of counseling.  At the time of her disappearance she was counseling teen girls who'd undergone extreme trauma in their lives.

What's her deal?

That's the mystery.  What is the deal?  Two years ago, Lizzie apparently left her husband and the life they'd built together.  Leaving only a disjointed note to explain her decision, Lizzie vanished.  Nick could never believe that Lizzie would take off the way she did, but many people remember how wild Lizzie had been as a teenager and figure it fit her character perfectly.  

Now, 2 years later, Lizzie returns by what seems to be coincidence to her hometown.  However, she has no memory of her past or who she was before she'd left.  Now, with the help of her friends, Lizzie has to figure out who she is and what happened to her before the man behind it strikes again.