Seeing More ThanWe Could See Before
A literary thriller about grief, culpability, and what happens when the search for meaning collides with the unbearable facts of ordinary life.
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One catastrophe. Every story that tries to explain it.
After three teenagers die at the edge of a cliff following a spirituality-and-meaning festival, everyone left behind reaches for a story that might make the horror intelligible: accident, negligence, suicide pact, manipulation, faith, failure. But as parents, organisers, and a public thinker are drawn into grief, media outrage, and legal reckoning, the question becomes harder and more dangerous: when language about awakening meets pain, longing, and vulnerability, who is responsible for what follows?
In dialogue with John Vervaeke
I met John in 2022 following an email exchange and we began to trace the overlap between my PhD work and his research on relevance realisation and the contemporary meaning crisis. Seeing More Than We Could See Before grew from that dialogue, asking what happens when ideas meant to awaken people to reality are received inside pain, loneliness, spiritual longing, and grief.
I am deeply grateful to John for allowing me to put his work on trial in this imaginative space. His openness and grace in being the subject under pressure were immeasurable.
Did they step willingly, or were they failed?
At the centre of the novel is a devastating uncertainty: did three vulnerable teenagers step willingly toward death, or were they failed by the adults, institutions, and ideas that surrounded them? As the aftermath unfolds, Faith Duval turns grief into a public campaign, Simon Duval searches for truth through law and argument, Alex Henley faces the collapse of everything he built, and John Vervaeke confronts the possibility that his words about transformation and awakening have done harm in the world.
This is a novel about grief and story, about the seduction of explanation, and about how quickly the dead can be turned into evidence for the living.
Explore the bookThemes
Meaning crisis, grief, culpability, faith, chronic pain, media, law, and the ethics of transformation.
Inside the novel
Multi-POV structure including Faith, Simon, Alex, and John, each bringing a different frame to the same catastrophe.
For readers of
Literary thrillers that combine psychological depth, moral ambiguity, and philosophical inquiry.
Launches, podcasts, panels and book clubs
Appearances and conversations about the meaning crisis, grief, spirituality, and narrative, listed as they are confirmed.
A note on content
This novel engages with teenage death, suicidality, grief, and spiritual vulnerability. It was written with care, but may be intense for some readers. If you have lived experience of suicidality or suicide loss, please treat your wellbeing as more important than finishing this book. reader guidance and crisis support resources are here.