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Ines Bautista-Yao with her latest novel, "Happily Ever After... Again."

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ABS-CBN Lifestyle

<div><span class="fr-img-caption fr-fic fr-dib" style="width:960px;display:block" width="960"><span class="fr-img-wrap"><img src="https://od2-image-api.abs-cbn.com/prod/editorImage/1780708664280INES-BAUTISTA.jpg" style="width:960px" class="fr-fic fr-dib" width="960"/><span class="fr-inner">Ines Bautista-Yao with her latest novel, &quot;Happily Ever After... Again.&quot;</span></span></span></div><p>Ines Bautista-Yao&#x27;s latest novel, &quot;Happily Ever After… Again&quot; (Penguin Books, 2026, 375 pages), is a refreshing romance about losing and finding love anew. </p><p>The heroine is Ilya Sebastian, a mother to preschooler twins who discovers her husband having an affair. While going through the requisite stages of grief and the stressful annulment process, she meets David – uncle to her twins&#x27; best friend with a tumultuous love life of his own. </p><p>Will David recognize her as his true love? Will Ilya allow herself to love again? Yao&#x27;s romance beyond the rebound is realistic yet buoyant, immersive and ultimately very satisfying.</p><p>Yao not only writes romance, she teaches it.  Her highly-sought after elective called &quot;Reading the Romance,&quot; offered by Ateneo de Manila&#x27;s Department of Interdisciplinary Studies, investigates romance stories not just as escapist fiction, but as complex cultural texts that reflect and challenge societal norms and gender roles.</p><p>We talked to Yao about her author journey, writing about marriage annulment, and the rewards of being a Romance prof. </p><div><strong>This is your 11th novel, wow!  What’s kept you writing novels since 2011?</strong></div><p>&quot;I&#x27;ve always wanted to write stories. When I was in grade school, I carried notebooks with me everywhere so that if I had free time, I would write. As I got older, life got in the way… but when I got pregnant, I felt the strong need to write fiction. </p><p>&quot;I started the first three chapters of my first book, &#x27;One Crazy Summer.&#x27; But I wasn’t sold on it and I hid it in a folder on my laptop. A few years later, I came across those chapters, and I wanted to know what happened next! So it turned into my very first book which I pitched to Summit Books. That was the beginning of my life as an author. </p><p>&quot;I had made the decision to not have a yaya so I could be fully involved in my daughters&#x27; lives. But that took up so much of who I was that even if I was still freelance writing and editing, I needed to have something that was just mine. Something I could create and be proud of that helped me feel that I was my own person, too.</p><p>&quot;After two books with Summit Books, I began self-publishing. I also joined the most wonderful romance community called #romanceclass, founded by Mina Esguerra. What encourages me and keeps me going is the support all around me.&quot;  </p><div><strong>What inspired this one? Who did you write it for?</strong></div><p>&quot;I based Ilya on a co-parent of mine who was separated from her husband. I started wondering what it would be like if she could have a happy ending. Then a thought hit me: What if I give her that happy ending?</p><p>&quot;As I turned it into a novel, I interviewed friends who had had annulments. What I found serendipitous was that even if I wasn&#x27;t looking for them, they would seemingly materialize before me. When I would bump into people at events, they would share their annulment journeys with me — without my asking! It felt like the universe was telling me to write this story. </p><p>&quot;I also drew on a lot of my experiences as a mother for this story — I think I was a parent rep from preschool to senior high. And oh, the drama that can take place among co-parents! I hung out at pick up time and co-parents would tell me about their lives.&quot;</p><div><strong>You take on some sensitive themes here: adultery, marriage annulment, single-woman pregnancy. What made you decide to bring all these into the book?</strong></div><p>&quot;When I decided to tackle love a second time around, these different themes emerged. I wanted to handle them with care so I did my research by talking to lawyers and people who had these experiences. Because I began with wanting to give Ilya her happily ever after, it came with annulment since there&#x27;s no divorce in the Philippines.</p><p>&quot;I also wanted to show an empowered woman in Bianca. Years ago, being pregnant and single would bring about disgrace and maybe even being ostracized from society. But today, it&#x27;s a different story. And if a woman finds herself in that situation, she can take control of the narrative and find joy in it!&quot;</p><div><strong>You teach a romance novel elective at Ateneo de Manila University. What&#x27;s that like?</strong></div><p>&quot;I love it so much. The students who usually gravitate towards this class are romance readers who aren&#x27;t afraid to take apart their favorite tropes, movies, stories, and characters. I give them concepts to discuss such as feminism versus romance, hegemonic masculinity, the heroine&#x27;s journey versus the hero&#x27;s journey, and so on. </p><p>&quot;Instead of regular papers, I ask them to write wedding vows between characters, promising to resist hegemonic masculinity. I ask them to defend a character who is being attacked by feminists. I ask them to write their own romance,just a story board, taking into consideration all these different concepts.&quot;</p><div><strong>Have you ever had a male student in the course?</strong></div><p>&quot;Yes! Some have told me that the discussions, the insights of their classmates, and the stories we read together have inspired them not just to be better boyfriends and husbands in the future, but also to be better men. Sometimes, when we discuss hegemonic masculinity, not all of them speak up and that&#x27;s completely understandable. They later tell me that they never felt attacked in class, but what they did feel was the widening of their minds and perspectives.&quot;  </p><div><strong>What makes a romance good?</strong></div><p>&quot;This is what my course is about! (laughs) I think the number one requirement is knowing you are headed towards happily ever after (HEA). Romance readers are willing to go along for a crazy ride as long as they know the characters are going to find their way to each other. But, at the same time, these characters need to deserve their HEA. They need to grow, they need to be strong, they need to be characters we can and want to root for.&quot;</p><div><strong>Is there really such a thing as a Happy Ever After? What&#x27;s your take? Why do you think so many still believe in it?</strong></div><p>&quot;Yes, I do believe there is such a thing as Happily Ever After. But I also believe that you need to keep working on it to keep it going. This is why I also think it&#x27;s important to have stories that happen after HEA as well. </p><p>&quot;Happily Ever After is really about hope. This is why so many believe in it. To hope is to be human — to believe in joy and in love. We are the only creatures on this planet who can love and who can hope. And with AI slowly taking over our lives, it is the one thing we can hold on to that only we as humans can do: to hope, to feel, and to love.&quot;</p><div><strong>ABOUT THE AUTHOR</strong></div><p>Vanessa Bicomong is a marketing teacher and consultant who has been writing book reviews since 2021. She is the program director for customer centricity at Acumen Strategy Consultants and general manager of The Learning Library, an online tutorial center offering reading comprehension and writing classes in English and Filipino.</p>

<p>Ines Bautista-Yao's latest novel, "Happily Ever After… Again" is a refreshing romance about losing and finding love anew.</p>

Ines Bautista-Yao's latest novel, "Happily Ever After… Again" is a refreshing romance about losing and finding love anew.

New novel 'Happily Ever After... Again' explores romance after adultery, annulment

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New novel 'Happily Ever After... Again' explores romance after adultery, annulment

ABS-CBN Lifestyle,

Vanessa Bicomong

Published June 06, 2026 10:00 AM PHT

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