We chat with author Nick Kolakowski about Where The Bones Lie, which is a fast-paced, darkly funny thriller with a twist you won’t see coming, PLUS we have an excerpt to share with you at the end of the interview!
Hi, Nick! Can you tell our readers a bit about yourself?
Yes! I’m a crime fiction and horror writer who lives in New York City. To help pay the rent, I’ve also worked as a journalist and editor in a number of fields—I was a travel writer for a long time, then I covered technology for a couple of big publications. I’m a huge fan of weirdo movies and ambient music and cats.
When did you first discover your love for writing and stories?
Like many writers, it all began when I was a little kid, when I wrote and illustrated tales about everything around me—the neighbors, the local wildlife, whatever Nintendo game obsessed me at the moment. As I grew older, the stories got longer, but I’ve never lost the urge to constantly filter the world around me through stories.
Quick lightning round! Tell us:
- The first book you ever remember reading: J.R.R. Tolkien’s “The Hobbit”
- The one that made you want to become an author: Raymond Chandler’s “Trouble Is My Business”
- The one that you can’t stop thinking about: Sara Gran’s “Come Closer”
Your latest novel, Where the Bones Lie, is out March 11th! If you could only describe it in five words, what would they be?
Climate change unleashes old mystery.
What can readers expect?
“Where the Bones Lie” takes the structure of a traditional detective mystery and updates it for our tense, often odd 21st century moment: I wanted to use the framework of two people investigating an old, infamous death to explore issues like the impact of climate change, toxic celebrity, and wealth disparity. At the same time, I didn’t want things to get pedantic, so I wrote it as a lightning-fast narrative loaded with twists—I want readers entertained and a bit terrified.
Where did the inspiration for Where the Bones Lie come from?
I’d always wanted to write a traditional detective novel, but I couldn’t find a solid hook. Then I started reading news stories about lakes drying up across the west, revealing the bones of mobsters who’d been tossed in the water decades ago. I thought that’d be a great foundation for a mystery of some kind. I ended up combining that idea with a few others rattling around in my skull, forming the kernel of the book’s plot: a disgraced Hollywood fixer pairs up with a young woman who wants to figure out what happened to her father, an infamous gangster who disappeared twenty years ago and whose remains have just been discovered in a rusty barrel in rural California.
Were there any moments or characters you really enjoyed writing or exploring?
I’ve always had a deep love of writing action setpieces, so it was a real blast to write the book’s finale, which largely takes place during a wildfire. Being in the presence of a firestorm is terrifying in real life—I’ve been near two, and I never want to get that close to a third—but it’s fun to figure out how your characters will survive that kind of thing, especially if they’re also being shot at.
Did you face any challenges whilst writing? How did you overcome them?
It took me quite some time to figure out the book’s ending (including the “culprit”). The original ending was much more straightforward, and it didn’t work—it was way too predictable. So I actually put the book aside for two or three months, despairing a little. Fortunately, my subconscious kept working the problem (as it often does), and a new, cooler ending popped into my head one morning without any prompting. I’d like to say I came up with some ingenious method for plowing past my block, but in the end, the unknowable part of me did the work.
What’s next for you?
I’m hoping that this book does well enough to merit a sequel, because I have a nifty idea for how to continue my detectives’ respective journeys. It’s very Michael Mann-esque.
Lastly, what books are you looking forward to picking up this year?
I’m a massive fan of Cassandra Khaw, and I’m very excited for their “The Library at Hellebore,” which sounds like an extremely dark, carnage-filled trip. I’m also looking forward to Rob Hart’s “Medusa Protocol,” the sequel to his fantastic thriller “Assassins Anonymous.” My TBR stack never seems to get any smaller…
Excerpt
In this passage, Dash Fuller, a disgraced Hollywood fixer, is meeting with Madeline Ironwood, who has phoned him with the offer of a job—but she’ll only tell him about the job in person. They’re meeting at a food truck in downtown L.A.
I spotted a flash of velvety black at the edge of that cluster of noontime workers. The next thing I noticed was the hair, red as a forest fire and shoulder-length. It spilled down the quilted shoulders of a Navy greatcoat with two rows of brass buttons down the front. The coat was open enough to reveal a black t-shirt with ‘NAH’ written across the front in jagged type.
She brushed away the hair curtaining her face. She had the kind of eyes a casting director would kill for, crackling with electricity, above freckled cheeks, pale lips, a strong chin.
When she saw me staring at her, she waved. Between the coat and the black jeans and the combat boots, she looked ready to walk the icy deck of a battlecruiser in the North Atlantic in December, and yet she wasn’t sweating. How weird was that?
“Either you’re the guy I called,” she said as I stopped a few feet away, “or you’re my next random stalker.”
“I’m the guy. My name’s Dash.”
We shook hands. Her palm was dry, her grip strong. “Madeline,” she said, nodding toward the food truck. “I hope you brought your appetite. How’re you on spice?”
“The hotter the better.” I’m trying to hasten the retreat of a nasty hangover, I didn’t add.
“You look like a masochist, so ask them for the Nuke Sauce. It’ll torch your tongue clean off. Myself, I always go for the weak stuff, because I get this mild IBS and it’s really a wonder to behold if I’ve eaten too much hotness, it’s—”
I winced. “Too much information, is what that is. Let’s order? Then you can tell me why I’m here.”
I read the chalkboard menu beside the food truck’s order window. I wasn’t a connoisseur of L.A. food trucks, but I hated the ones that took a great cuisine—Mexican, Korean, BBQ, what-have-you—and tried to “fuse” it with something else. The last thing I wanted on my chicken burrito was kimchi or pickled ginger. Los Lobos Tacos offered no-frills Mexican, deliciously loaded with all the calories my body craved after living off whiskey and noodles for too long. I went for the chorizo Big Dog burrito and a Coke while Madeline opted for three fried-fish tacos and a bottle of water.
After ordering and receiving our food, we perched midway up the massive concrete steps outside the Zipper, above the unending tide of office workers and homeless folks, where we could enjoy our calories in relative peace. My hangover was in full retreat. Maybe it was the combination of a blazing sun and hot sauce forcing me to sweat out the toxins from the past few days. Maybe it was the chance to talk to another interesting, weird human being.
“Hot enough for you?” she asked after a minute.
I offered a thumbs-up. “You know what? This is hardcore.”
“Glad to help. If you’re not a licensed detective, what are you?”
The great existential question. “I used to be an investigator for a company,” I said. Again, only a few clicks away from the truth. “I didn’t like how they ran things, so I left. I guess I’m exploring what it’d mean to be an independent.”
“What happened with Karl?”
I shook my head. “Couldn’t tell you.”
“You keep secrets, good. You pass my rigorous vetting.” She crunched down more food. “Can I tell you about my issue?”
“Sure. I don’t sign NDAs, by the way.” Was she a journalist or a blogger? Did she have a recording device tucked into that greatcoat? My instincts told me she was after something other than a few quotes about a star’s death. Besides, reporters always have a desperate gaze, like a Pomeranian that hasn’t eaten real meat in a month.
“I wouldn’t know the first thing about writing an NDA,” she said. “My full name’s Madeline Ironwood. My father was Ken Ironwood. You ever hear of him?”
“No.”
She pointed across the street at the giant banner hanging from the side of an office building. The top of the banner featured a black-and-white image of a thin, severe man in a pale suit, a cigarette between his lips and an antique pistol in his left hand. Bullets, sprays of white powder, and reels of film were scattered across the image and the title beneath: ‘SLINGER: A TRUE CRIME SERIES.’ And below that, the red logo of the world’s largest streaming company.
“That’s him,” she said. “Reduced to eight hour-long episodes, I’m sure it’ll be a big hit, but I won’t see it. I think there’s a podcast, too, but I won’t listen to it. Insult to injury, they’re not paying me a dime, either.”
“I’m sorry.” I pointed at the pistol in the man’s hand. “Was he an assassin or something?”
She chuckled. “No, he was obsessed with old cowboy movies, the ones where two guys have a showdown at high noon? He even bought one of the prop pistols from ‘The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly.’ My father was a big smuggler, mostly drugs. When I was a kid, they told me if it came through a port on the West Coast, he touched it at some point along the line. I’m not sure I believe that—criminals love to exaggerate—but he was big. He used to hang out with movie stars, singers, all kinds of famous people. I have a photo of him at a party, standing next to Bruce Willis and Ah-nold.”
“That end up in the series?” I was already thinking of ways to verify her story. Trust but verify, Manny always told me. I think he stole that from Ronald Reagan.
“No, but other photos did. It’s all I have, because he disappeared when I was two, so I don’t remember much of him except for some flashes. My mother got remarried within, like, six months.”
“They never found him?”
“No.”
“The cops have any theories?”
“Sure, they had lots of theories. So did the FBI. There were roughly a thousand suspects. The Columbians, the Mexicans, the Triads, a pissed-off movie star, maybe even LAPD. But after a couple years of not finding a body, they gave up the search.”
“That’s not the whole story.”
She took her time wiping her fingers with a paper napkin. “You’re psychic. That’s indeed not the whole story. You ever hear of San Douglas?”
“Sure, it’s north of Santa Barbara, near Santa Ynez. They have a bunch of wineries. Some good restaurants, too.” I had driven through it once. I recalled a main street lined with a cute post office, a few touristy wine stores, and an upscale steakhouse. The kind of place that existed for the pleasure of the millionaires and billionaires who owned expansive compounds in the surrounding hills. At least it wasn’t one of those desert hellscapes filled with redneck outlaws and trailer parks.
“They also have a big lake, which is drying up. Where the water’s receding, they’re finding things.” Opening her greatcoat, she reached into an interior pocket and drew a folded stack of paper. “Take a look.”
I folded the papers open. It was a terrible reproduction of a digital photo, high-contrast and pixelated, and I had to flip the image a few times before I recognized a rusted barrel poking from wet mud. The next page was a beginning of a medical examiner’s report, breaking down in clinical detail the skeletonized remains found inside that barrel. In the tattered remains of the skeleton’s suit, the cops had discovered a wallet with Ken Ironwood’s driver’s license in it, along with four hundred dollars in cash and a plastic poker chip.
The condition of the remains made it difficult to determine the cause of death. Several blows to the jaw and lower skull had removed several teeth, and two ribs were broken, although it was impossible to tell if those injuries had happened pre- or post-mortem.
Madeline sighed. “It’s been almost two months since they told me. I want to grieve for him. I keep trying to make myself cry. Nothing comes.”
“I’m sorry.” I flipped to the last pages. The condition of the skeleton made any toxicology report impossible, of course. There was also a topographical map of a lake and the surrounding roads, with a tiny X at the leftmost edge. “You got this fast.”
“What?”
“The medical examiner’s report. Usually they have a backlog, it takes them forever to put one out.”
“Yeah, that’s what they told me. The San Douglas Sheriff’s Department doesn’t care about this. Even if they did, they don’t have the resources to tackle it, because the whole department is four people, I think. LAPD says it’s out of their jurisdiction. I’ve tried calling the FBI, and they keep blowing me off.”
“Which is why you called me, a guy you saw in a comedy club.”
She laughed. “If it makes you feel better, you weren’t my first choice. I tried hiring three private detectives. The first two stopped returning my calls, the third one was a creep.”
“I have another suggestion you might absolutely hate.”
“Getting the documentary guys involved?”
“Yep. They have the resources, right?”
“I tried that, too. You know what they said? The episodes were locked, but if enough people watched it, they’d be happy to consider doing another season. I won’t sit on my ass and wait for a studio exec to greenlight the answer to my life’s biggest question.”
“Sounds wise.”
“Besides, these documentary guys? They’re daredevil types. They’re probably paragliding in the Andes. Which sounds like a darn good way to lower your life expectancy, but I’m notable for my lack of fun.”
“I like keeping my feet on the ground. If we were meant to soar through the air, we would’ve grown wings by this point.” I waved my hands beside my ears.
She stared at me. Her pupils were large and dark in a way that reminded me of Amber Rodney—galactic in the right light. “So that all leads me to you,” she said. “I don’t really know who you are, but if you could find Karl Quaid, maybe you can help me find out what happened to my father. And I’ll pay, of course, if it’s reasonable.”
