Beneath the Rings follows a veteran journalist who finds herself in the middle of an international incident when twelve athletes vanish from the Olympic Village. The premise feels disturbingly plausible. How close did you want this world to feel to our present reality?

My goal in crafting the story arc was to root it somewhat realistically. The kidnapping of the twelve athletes harkens back to the 1972 Munich Olympics hostage crisis, where the Palestinian militant group Black September carried out a terrorist attack on the Israeli team, resulting in the deaths of 11 athletes and coaches. While the premise of this recurring seems disturbingly plausible, the level of security at the Olympic Games now versus 54 years ago does require the reader to somewhat suspend disbelief. The likelihood of an attack like the one carried out in Beneath The Rings happening today is pretty slim. But, I guess you never really know, which is what builds the suspense.

Nova is a journalist rather than a spy or soldier, making her an intriguing choice for this role. What was your inspiration for this character? 

Nova’s character weaves personal echoes, real-world colleagues, and legacies of trailblazing women who’ve redefined journalism. Drawing from my roots, industry friendships, and historical figures who turned adversity into ammunition, here’s what fueled her creation.

Nova’s foundation is deeply personal, honoring my Newark, New Jersey upbringing. While I grew up in the North Ward of the Brick City, Nova hails from the Weequahic neighborhood—a vibrant, middle-class Jewish enclave where family and community resilience shaped her. Running Newark’s streets became her ritual, mirroring my own experiences in that gritty city, instilling quiet fortitude. Her solitary runs defy an unmoored world.

Her parents—Judith, a sharp-witted public-school teacher, and David, a steady accountant—echo my nurturing yet expectation-filled home. My mother, Fran, was also a teacher; my father, Ted, an entrepreneur. They raised me and my sister, Jessica, with education as key. Nova attends Solomon Schechter Day School near Seton Hall Prep, which I attended. She heads to Syracuse—where my father grew up after emigrating from Italy—for journalism, but detours to law at Seton Hall, like my sister’s JD.

This pivot reflects practical pressures, but for Nova, it’s a cage. Her return to journalism after Manhattan practice draws from my friend Alan Abrahamson, who graduated from Northwestern’s Medill School before earning his law degree at UC Hastings. He spent 17 years at the Los Angeles Times. Alan sparked Nova as an independent Olympic journalist. As founder of 3 Wire Sports, he’s a beacon in Olympic coverage, blending analysis with honesty. We collaborated at NBC Olympics from 2008-2014, where I saw him peel back the Games’ layers—politics, ethics, human stories. Nova’s platform, OlymPulse, mirrors Alan’s independent voice: probing storylines mainstream outlets overlook. His influence makes her a veteran of 14 Olympics by 2040, her reporting a rebellion against gloss.

Nova’s grit—navigating harassment in Beirut or personal loss—draws from Lara Logan, the former CBS correspondent known for fearless war reporting. Logan’s 2011 assault in Egypt embodies resilience that refuses silence. Nova channels this: surviving the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing, shifting from runner to reporter amid chaos, and enduring the 2017 crash that kills her parents. Logan’s confrontation of danger sharpens Nova’s hyper-vigilance, turning trauma into journalistic fuel.

Historical figures add tenacity. Nellie Bly, the 19th-century pioneer who feigned insanity to expose asylums and circled the globe in 72 days, lends Nova audacious truth-seeking. Bly’s undercover work mirrors Nova’s infiltration of Olympic shadows, risking all for revelation.

Ida Tarbell’s muckraking exposés on Standard Oil—methodical takedowns of corruption—inspire Nova’s IOC probes, showing one woman’s research can topple empires.

In sports, Helene Elliott, the veteran LA Times writer who covered the Olympics for decades, layers Nova’s ethos. Elliott’s trailblazing—including the “Miracle on Ice” plus being the first female Hockey Hall of Fame honoree—fuels Nova’s focus on the voiceless. Her moral clarity cuts through hype.

Lesley Visser, the broadcasting pioneer first to cover Super Bowl sidelines and Olympics, embodies barrier-breaking. Visser’s poise and elevation of women’s voices shape Nova’s solitary ascent in a male-dominated field, turning isolation into a superpower.

Blending these created Nova and forged her into a truth sentinel. In Beneath the Rings, she navigates terrorism and conspiracy, a testament to how personal and historical forces birth unbreakable resolve. 

If Nova resonates, it’s from real warriors who’ve shaped our world—and my path.

Beneath the action, the book raises questions about vengeance, historical grievance, and moral reckoning. How conscious were you of those themes while writing?

I was quite conscious of these themes in crafting The Obsidian Hand and the group’s motivation. I did weeks of research on conflicts in the Middle East and wanted to make sure that I was rooting the group as a whole and each individual to historically accurate discords so that their disenfranchisement felt real. Some of those details are spelled out in the book, but for more in-depth backstories on the characters themselves, you can read blog posts on each on my website, booksbybattaglia.com.

I greatly enjoyed following Nova, and it feels like she has more stories to tell. Do you see this as the beginning of a series?

Most definitely!

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