Red Stork is a poor southerner who has a mind for business and hard work. He is strapped down with his cousin in the back woods of Mize, Mississippi in the 1930's, where eating regular and sex are a staple. He helps to raise his adult children and takes care of his wife and farm. Red knew he would leave because he's been itching to do so for thirty-four years and finally, gets the guts. His children are not mentally capable of taking care of themselves, but they were raised to farm. Unbeknownst to Red, he is the glue that holds this tattered family together and the minute he leaves, the family destroys themselves. Like everything in Red's life, his adventure to find freedom has a few hitches. His old truck breaks down, the woman he takes with him finds a better romantic interest, and Red is left to his own devices. Love finds him in an unconventional way. Red becomes an upstanding citizen in his fifties and tales of his fortune spread to his old hometown in Mississippi. With his family history of incest, rape, murder, and domestic violence, Red is able to make a semi-decent man of himself despite his upbringing. His story is the story of many Americans from the rural South.Southern Fried Crazy tells the story of not just Red Stork but of his lesbian cousin, his mistress who settles down with a black man, and a wealthy business man who has a hidden Native American family his siblings will not accept. Southern Fried Crazy is filled with diversity and a complicated view of the lust for life and survival.
