How ‘The Fugitive’ Director and an Investigative Journalist Collaborated on 2024’s Timeliest Thriller

On the other hand, as someone from that field, there’s a lot of amazing investigative analysis going on, and I deeply appreciate fellow journalists who are out there rolling up their sleeves. For example, that At the Brink series that W.J. Hennigan is doing at the New York Times about nukes is just riveting. It’s really thorough journalism that’s doing an incredible service.

Davis: Meanwhile, the Los Angeles Times has gotten so thin, it’s unbelievable. And that’s one of the biggest papers in the country. So we’re in real trouble in terms trying to get information out, as people are also saying, “I can’t watch the news anymore.” Of course, we’re also now learning that this was a much closer election than people were originally talking about. It’s not a carte blanche [mandate].

Andy, the book was written ahead of Kamala Harris replacing Joe Biden at the head of the Democratic ticket. Did you see that as a possibility and created the candidate in the book accordingly?

Davis: That character is based on Michelle Obama. I grew up on the South Side of Chicago, and she went to the high school near me. I’m very touched that, in our story, the main character is a copy who loses his mother at the age of 14 and comes to Chicago where he’s protected by this woman from the tough kids in the neighborhood. Now she’s running for president and he feels he’s got to be involved with her campaign. It’s a very emotional piece of the story to me that they have this relationship.

Jeff, as someone who had mainly written nonfiction and journalism prior to this, was there any kind of a learning curve?

Biggers: With nonfiction you have these boundaries and protocols, whereas with fiction you’re free to create as you wish. I’ve done a lot of work in the theater, so I was able to bring that experience to the dialogue. One of the key parts of writing fiction is having character speak their truth in a way that you relate to and think is authentic. So that worked out well.

And then once again, I think our novel isa bout taking these stories that are in the headlines and getting them down on the page in a way that makes the reader question what’s going on in the real world. When the New York Times reviewed Under Siege in 1992, they said something along the lines of: “Andrew Davis is blending art and action to ask provocative questions about nuclear weapons.” That’s precisely what we’re trying to do with Disturbing the Bones—blend art and action to ask provocative questions about the media, nuclear weapons and America’s social divisions.

The book ends on a bit of a cliffhanger. Are there plans for a follow-up?

Davis: This is my first time in the book business, and you’re pretty much on your own. For me, it’s a question of whether it makes sense to spend another two or three years writing the next novel. Maybe it’ll be easier, because we’ve got the fabric laid out. Or we can ask AI to take the elements of this book and give us another one! [Laughs]