Why I Wrote Evil on the Roof of the World

Prologue Lauren Geoghegan and Jay Austin quit their Washington jobs and on July 17, 2017, began a bike trip around the world. On July 29, 2018, they biked along Highway A 385 in the Danghara District after biking through the Pamir Mountains of Tajikistan along with five other cyclists. The Pamir Highway climbs to elevations of 15,000 feet and was once known as the Silk Road. One hundred kilometers south of the capital of Tajikistan, Dushanbe, five ISIS terrorists ran the cyclists down with a South Korean Daewoo sedan and brutally murdered the two Americans along with a Dutch national and a Swiss citizen. Newspapers, radio stations, and television stations in the United States and around the world would pick up the story of the two twenty-nine-year-old Americans and speculate how two highly educated, well-connected millennials from Washington, DC, had crashed into the homicidal sights of ISIS terrorists on a remote mountain highway in Tajikistan. I read Jay and Lauren’s story in the New York Times in 2018, shortly after it happened. I was intrigued. Not so much by the horrifying way they died, but the crashing together of different cultures on a deserted mountain highway in Tajikistan. I was also intrigued by what motivated Jay and Lauren to leave well-paying Washington jobs and take the road less traveled. After writing a proposal for the publisher and digging into some research, I found Jay’s declaration that “he didn’t want to waste his years in front of a small rectangular screen at the Department of Housing and Urban Development, retire at sixty-five, and then die ten years later.” This resonated with me; it fit in with Americans who have thrown a conventional life aside to pursue a life less certain. Jay and Lauren’s desire for adventure or a different American dream fits the pantheon of people looking for something beyond the safe confines of a world without risk. American history is littered with adventurers, from Amelia Earhart’s daring aerial exploration to Teddy Roosevelt heading West to the Badlands, to Jack London’s famous trek into the Yukon, to Mark Twain lighting out for the territories, to Thomas Stevens, who in 1887 biked around the world on a big wheel bicycle, all the way back to Thoreau, and up to the present day of Chris McCandless’s journey into the wilds of Alaska.

Is the World too Dangerous to Travel Now?

My book Evil on the Roof of the World is about Jay Austin and Lauren Geohegan who decided to travel around the world in 2017. They quit their jobs and for a year planned their trip. They checked the State Department travel advistories that said the places they were planning to bike thorugh were safe. They paid close attention to the advisory on Tajikistan which borderes Afghanistan. Still the State Department advisory said it was safe. So they biked through Africa and Europe and had a few problems but nothing life threatening. Lauren felt that New York City was just as dangerous or more so than Tajikistan. When they entered the Pamir Mountains known also as The Roof of the World they were excited. This scenic route through the clouds was a the high point of their trip and again when they checked the State Department site there were no new warnings. On July 29 2018 they were spotted by ISIS terrorists who followed the couple then mowed them down with their car and attacked with butcher knives. When I was researching the book with friends and family I asked many times if Jay and Lauren were concerned about the risks of their trip. Jay blogged about the risks before they left saying without risk there is no adventure. When they stopped and stared across a river at Afghanistan Lauren expressed her fear to a fellow cyclist,Kim Potsma. She was scared but they had been biking a full year and while they had some dangerous encounters they had managed to stay on course and nothing had really threatened their lives. But now they had been killed at the hands of ISIS and social media went wild on how foolish, stupid, and arrogant these two millenials were to belive they could bike anywhere they wanted in the world. Many people took offence and saw the two Georgetown Graduates as emblematic of an entitled generation that felt the rules did not apply to them. Some people who posted were gleefully cruel. The Washington Post examined Lauren and Jays decision to bike through Afghanistan and asked the question if they were niave in their view of the world. Jay had famously said he did not belive in evil as a concept. Many in the blogosphere roasted him for this assertion. The Post concluded they were not niave and knew the risks and had taken all precautions. Their deaths were a large part due to bad luck. Destiny is a lonely word and to say they were destined to meet up with terrorists is a hard thing to get our heads around. I go back to Jays assertion that without risk there is no adventure. The State Department after the attack elevated the risk level on Tajikistan. Still, thousands of people bike the Pamir highway every year. It is a great adventure. Evil on the Roof of the World is due out in November

Early Reviews for Evil on the Roof of the World Compare to Krakauer Into The Wild

“Lauren and Jay chased wonder on two wheels across continents, only to meet evil face-to- face—Evil on the Roof of the World is a sobering, gut-punch reminder that even the boldest dreams aren't safe from the darkness we pretend doesn't exist.” —Cory Mortensen, bestselling author of The Buddha and the Bee “A compelling investigation of both the liberating triumph and ultimate tragedy of Lauren and Jay’s cycle adventure. Evil on the Roof of the World sensitively explores the open-heartedness, courage and complicated motivations of two promising twenty-somethings and poses profound questions about the world we live in and the nature of risk and reward.” —Charlie Walker, award-winning British explorer, author of Through Sand & Snow and On Roads That Echo, and keynote speaker “Propelled by idealism and determination, Jay and Lauren set out to cycle around the world. Believing in the essential goodness of humanity, the couple find kindness and hospitality while slogging through desert sand in Namibia, fleeing an enraged elephant in Botswana, and enduring freezing rain in Spain. William Elliott Hazelgrove’s gripping account, reminiscent of Jon Krakauer's Into the Wild, chronicles Jay and Lauren’s epic journey toward an encounter with terrorists who decide that slaughtering these youthful seekers will serve ISIS’s cause.” —Doug Kari, author of The Berman Murders