❝ NOTHING BUT THE OPEN ROAD AND THE NEVER ENDING WHY ❞
STATS:
Name: Jacob Randall
Age: 40
Face Claim: Chris Evans
Occupation: Former crime journalist & novelist
Neighborhood: Wrightsville Beach
Gender & Preferred Pronouns: Cis male & he/him
BIOGRAPHY:
trigger warnings: heart condition, death
Born and raised in Wilmington, Jacob Randall is the oldest of four children created by a construction worker turned developer and a dental assistant. They were a large family yet a genuinely happy and well-balanced family. His biggest obsession as a child was basketball. Anywhere and anytime he could play, Jacob had a ball in his hands and dreamed of one day being in the NBA. If at all possible he wouldn’t miss a game on television, and often got in trouble for dribbling and tossing that ball around the house. He played for the YMCA, youth leagues, and his schools. Which eventually earned him a scholarship to the University of Arizona.
Aside from basketball, the biggest dream he had was to be a writer. It was something he shared with his grandfather, his love for books and reading. They’d talk about all the books they read, sometimes even read the same so they could compare notes, and his grandfather had once told Jacob that he wished he had gotten into the publishing business. It inspired Jacob once in university, he studied english and creative writing, played basketball and picked up beach volleyball, and somewhere along the way he ended up taking a bit of a detour. In needing to fulfill credits and requirements, Jacob took a journalism class and his writing got him noticed. He ended up really loving the writing style and found that he had natural instincts as an investigator.
Once he graduated Jacob had a few daily newspapers seeking him out but he chose the The Charlotte Observer to return home and began working the crime desk. It turned into a bit of an obsession for Jacob. The job, he worked non-stop, covering the biggest crime stories in the state, and while he built up a reputation and eventually won himself a Pulitzer Prize it all came at the sacrifice of his family and friendships. Every single relationship he tried had failed due to him not being present enough. Jacob always put the work and writing first, he believed he was doing important work and was going to make a difference, and had always been very proud, but it eventually took too big of a toll.
When his mother was diagnosed with a heart condition, Jacob wrongly assumed he had more time than he did and not only missed out on most of her suffering and being there to be a support for her, he hadn’t been there when she passed away. Instead, Jacob had been off investigating a story. The story turned out to be one of the biggest of his career, and maybe also the most dangerous. One that challenged him as a human being; his values, what he stood for, who has the right of justice.
A woman had reached out to him, telling him about something that had been happening on cruise ships. It was something she had done her own little investigation into because her friend went missing at sea. Digging into it he found that there was a history to this, something that has never really been made hugely public and garnered enough press attention. So Jacob went on the investigative hunt trying to find out what happened with this missing woman and found out there was one before her and almost a year to the date. In the end, he uncovered the truth and found the person responsible, but committed his own crime in the process. Something Jacob now has to live with himself over.
After that and the passing of his mother, he kept the promise he had made to himself and quit investigative journalism. He’d always intended and had meant to be a novelist. Since then he’s written five New York Time’s Best Sellers. Using some of his experiences as a crime reporter for inspiration.
