Rob Ryser

Great Desires for Absent Things Rob Ryser

An inspiring saga of death and rebirth... An unforgettable portrayal of second chance survival... A triumph of life over logic... Five people at breaking points face change that none of them expected when the truth about a newspaper reporter's criminal past suddenly comes out. The drama opens with the fall of the hero whose idea to save everyone will only work if he conquers his fear of action. This 28-year-old journalist with one year of sobriety and a burning desire to live a new life cannot elude his past of thieving and deceiving. Faced with an impossible mission to act on faith that he is still forming, the hero finds his footing worse than it ever was drunk. The battles that follow with his tortured mentor from AA, with the voluptuous AIDS-stricken half-sister of his wife, and with the boy who knows him only as an uncle set off existential struggles over identity and destiny. It takes the destruction of a speeding Conrail, a daring deathbed confession, a revenge-fueled wrestling match with an Army major, a messy self-castration and the birth of a baby girl named Happy for the characters to realize that ideas without action are dead.