Story and Analysis
Beauty from Pain
The true story of 36 year old Londoner Ryan describes how he falls for and grows ever closer to his beloved burlesque-dancing partner Maya.
After a turbulent few months of inconsistent but potent connection, Indian Maya disappears suddenly. Ryan, by his own principles chooses not to pursue her but instead must endure a prolonged period of depression and confusion. Medication, escape, new hobbies, old vices, new business ventures, and rediscovering intimacy with his adorable new India-born, Italian partner Bea are all part of his recovery.
In the Wake of Her is Ryan's telling of a love that could never be, and becomes much more immersive thanks to his accompanying psychoanalytical companion guide, initially available separately, which completes the picture with footnotes featuring input from consulting professionals and philosophies from Ryan's rules for life. This is a bare-all, true tale of warring personalities and open relationships in a modern metropolis which enables the author to take readers in detail through attachment theory, non-mongamy, fixer syndrome, and romantic endeavour.
Why did the romance feel so right at times and crippling at others?
Why were Ryan's friends constantly reminding him to stay true to himself?
Why did Maya leave? And what is she thinking now?
What were those formative experiences that meant that it was easier for Maya to run?
Can Ryan obtain a formal professional diagnosis for himself and for his tragic ex-partner in absentia?
Therapy Framework and Study Proposal
As well as compliementing the narrative, resulting in a groundbreaking format - a triptych of Story, Analysis, Creative Writing - In the Wake of Her: The Companion Guide also contains a revolutionary framework for SSCPT. This is a new type of therapy that provides patients with clarity and validation to minimise their doubts and rumination about past events. This proposed new treatment became the core service of Dufton Enterprise's therapy consultation clinic, SARJ.
The Story Continues...
After Her
In the next 6 months following Minti's world-shattering discard by Maya, he re-enters the dating marketplace, where he begins to look at people with whom he was thus far only platonic or physical in a different light. Even Eolanda, his avoidant ex, is a viable option again. His Malaysian friend, Amber, has blocked him. Prospective partners are finding his depression, lasting trauma bond, and obsessive research into relationship dynamics too much for them to trust Ryan with their hearts. Meanwhile Maya's friends are dropping off Ryan's radar as he conducts his panicked fight to keep her hypnotic light in his life.
Ryan's post-breakup adventures are punctuated by searching conversations with his therapist, James, in which he recounts the play by play of all the wonderful and terrible memories that still seem like only yesterday. His suffering accelerates many huge life changes including eye surgery, motorbiking, joining the army, starting new businesses, revisiting his past, taking multiple trips to north India, the crucible of Maya, that he might better understand and sympathise with her origin story.
This tale is told in the upcoming novelisation, In the Wake of Her: The Story of Ryan Minti
Diagnoses one a piece
In a surprising turn of events, Ryan's therapist highlights the descriptions of childhood, obsessive pursuit of interests, compulsive behaviours, limerence within relationships, ruminative ruts without relationships, hyper rationality, hyper empathy, formularisation of social etiquette, and high iQ. The diagnosis is one he suspected, but to have it officially recognised is a another thing altogether.
Ryan must contend with his new label and fit it into his model of self and be aware of its strengths and weaknesses as he manages work, romances, friendships, and the various pursuits that now fill his week.
He continues to work with his therapist on escaping the mental pit that he has been left in. He fights the urge to intercept Maya's colleagues, therapist and family as he sees all the relationship safety nets fail to engage.
Road to Recovery
Ryan is supported in his journey by the love of an Indian-born but Italian-adopted girl, Bea, whose warm heart, affirming spirit, quiet nature, and consistent words of validation keep him grounded and happy. Her patience is challenged however, as his incessant ruminations and newfound book-writing project seem to her to keep him mired in the past. As Ryan struggles with daily flashbacks, artifacts of the trauma of the blindsiding, Bea finds herself being dragged into a battle for Ryan's presence. It's love, but not as either have known it for quite some time.
Six months after the disappearance, when Maya instructs organisers to remove Ryan from the guestlist of one of their shows, Ryan's image of her starts to shift. During a chance encounter, Maya character-assassinates Ryan to his best friend Vidya which develops his image of her as broken and delusional. He finally emails her with all the words he's been wanting to say. When she replies to him with a rant of unhinged allegations, Ryan is finally freed from the bonds of his incessant thought spirals and learns to live without the obsession of a girl who doesn't exist and maybe never did, but also to live with the deep wounds that this ghost-of-a-woman caused.
Follow escapades in the kink and sex-pos scene in modern London, and learn to love again with this dramatic retelling of Ryan's life In the Wake of Her...
Coming March 2026