New Fathers

Ryan Paul has become a regular. The folks up at his local coffee shop, The Meanest Bean, know his name and they know his drink. And why wouldn’t they? The Meanest Bean is where he sits everyday of his life sipping cold coffee, watching life pass by. But Ryan loathes the routine he has fallen into. He is desperate for a diversion or two to destroy the routine.

Ryan has moved back to the city of Abbotsford. Back into the bedroom he slept in when he was a child. The same posters are taped to the wall. The same comforter covers the bed. It’s not a place he thought he’d ever see again. But life out of college wasn’t as smooth a transition as he thought it would be. The job of his dreams was unattainable. And he is sleeping all the time now, mostly involuntarily. His father is dying and his mother won’t come clean about the time she dropped him off of a B.C. Ferry when he was a child.

Ryan hides from his reality at The Meanest Bean, where one day is no different than any other. It is where he meets Fraser Janzen and Todd Phillips, the two high school friends he swore he saw the last of when he graduated five years earlier. They tell stories, dream, and make up excuses. And then one day their mundane existence is disturbed when a giant coffee company called Ahab’s purchases a shop across the street from The Meanest Bean, threatening the existence of Ryan’s one solace. The news of the giant coffee shop is overshadowed by the news of two young girls who were attacked and beaten a few blocks away from The Meanest Bean. One of the girls made it to the local hospital where she slipped into a coma, but the other girl wasn’t so lucky. She disappeared.

The opening of the giant coffee shop. The missing girl. They are the diversions Ryan has been searching for. He just doesn't know it yet.

Do we become the person we are because of the innate qualities we are born with or do we become the person we are because of what happens to us along the way? In NEW FATHERS, Ryan Paul learns it’s a little of both. Being raised as he has makes him want more. More love. More excitement. More hope. Boredom and coincidence takes him on a journey that opens his eyes up to a new existence... a new life where love and hope is in abundance. At a price.