it turned out to be a vertebra ofjorge eliecer gaitan, a colombian liberal leader, murdered in 1948.nd not only that but also a part of the skull of rafael uribe uribe, another colombian leader, murdered in 1914. so having these bones in my hand and then going back to the hospital to take my girls in the same hands, that was the origin of the novel that suggested the idea of the inheritance of violence. i thought how could i protect these girls from the past violence of the country? and it was such a potent thing that i decided that inventing a narrator to tell this would just ruin the whole idea. you couldn't take yourself out of the story after that experience. exactly, exactly. i had to putjuan gabriel vasquez as a narrator in order not to undermine, i guess, the personal importance the whole thing had for me. one of the powerful things about this story is that sense of, you know, a piece of information being passed and a quest beginning. yes. which becomes something that has to be satisfied, it has to be completed. it can't be left. yes. the idea of investigation is very importan