Uh-oh. What's the PROTOCOL for THAT?

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: Debut author day! And what fun to find a brand new author with a brand new book—not only the reading-of-it part, but the idea that there’s a person who now knows the joys and the delights, the terrors and the fears. The hugely satisfying moment when that new box of books arrives—and your dream has come true.

And you also know that inevitably, someone will ask: where did you get your idea? But ha! Kathleen Valenti has a terrific and tantalizing (and terrifying!) answer. Whoa. What would you do if this happened to you?

(There’s more about her book PROTOCOL below. And an ARC to one lucky commenter!)
(And yesterday's winners below!)

Technobabbling

By Kathleen Valenti

My husband and I recently watched Apollo 13 with our two children. The film’s a favorite of ours and was a natural inclusion in our self-designed list of Films the Kids Must See. (Last month’s showing: The Princess Bride.)

Our pre-teen son is a movie mimic, so I knew he’d love the zippy one-liners. His favorite line wasn’t the iconic real-life utterance, “Houston, we have a problem,” but rather the reference to technological advances “like a computer that can fit into a single room.”

Forget space travel and rockets and astronauts stranded in a flying life raft. The idea of

a room-sized computer was what captured his imagination.

It made me think of how far technology has come.

That computer that guided the astronauts’ journey? It can now fit inside a cell phone. And that cell phone? In a recent survey, eighty-four percent of Americans said they couldn’t go a day without it.

It also called to mind the genesis of one of my book’s primary storylines.

Technology has a starring role in my debut novel, Protocol, not because I’m super-techy (understatement alert), but because its omnipresence, with all of its attendant risks, gave me an idea for a murder mystery after I had my own technology puzzle to solve.

Several years ago, I sent my laptop to the manufacturer for repair. It came back with someone else’s hard drive, complete with all its digital contents. Turned out the computer snafu went both ways. My hard drive had been swapped into the computer that once housed the stranger’s hard drive I now possessed.

The mix-up left both of us vulnerable and me with the seed of an idea for a hook for the book I always wanted to write.

Houston, I have an idea.

Ideas, as they say, can come from anywhere. Evidently that includes computer problems.

I have a love-hate relationship with technology, and I think many of us can relate. After all, it’s responsible for both important advancements in science and medicine (and cute cat videos) and a crack through which danger can crawl, whether by hacking, identity theft or something much more nefarious.

So what is technology for you? Blessing? Curse? The font of awesome BuzzFeed quizzes? (I just learned that if I were a sandwich, I’d be a PB&J.)

And what real-life events have inspired you creatively? We may not be astronauts stranded in space, but we all have moments—big, small, happy and tragic—that inform the stories we tell.

 HANK: Wait wait wait! What happened about the hard drive? 

(I admit I always take those tests, too. Except for the ones that make it clear they’re swiping your entire email list. Plus, it’s fun to take them twice and see how you can make them come out the way you want, right?)

And you know every one of the inciting moments of my books is a version of something that really happened to me.

But technobabble! The things that come out of  our mouths—the two years ago we’d have no idea what meant! (How many gigs of ram? I store it all in the cloud?)  

What have you said recently, Reds and readers, that surprised you with your techno-knowledge?

Or else: what's on your list of must-see movies for kids?

 (And see below for yesterday's winners!)

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Kathleen Valenti is the author of Protocol, the story of freshly minted college graduate Maggie O’Malley who embarks on a pharmaceutical career fueled by professional ambition and a desire to escape the past. Yet on her very first day of work, Maggie’s pulled into a world of uncertainty as reminders appear on her phone for meetings she’s never scheduled with people she’s never met. People who end up dead.

When Kathleen isn’t writing page-turning mysteries that combine humor and suspense, she works as a nationally award-winning copywriter. She lives in Oregon with her family where she pretends to enjoy running. Protocol is her debut novel and the first of the Maggie O’Malley mystery series.

Pre-order Protocol here:

Amazon: amzn.to/2su4eq0

Barnes & Noble: bit.ly/2sUHKvQ

iTunes: apple.co/2skdTPw

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Kobo: bit.ly/2s6ZnIJ


(Winners from yesterday--tell us your addresses via our websites or Facebook! Hurray--and thank you!)
!

Lucy's winner   Idteacher 14

Ingrid's winner  Hulamom

Hank's winner   Karen M from Kentucky

Rhys' winner .  Raquel Muniz 

Hallie's winner .Sally from PA. 

Jenn's winner  Coralee 

Debs' winner: Marni 

On Happy Endings... the mine rescue

Foreman Florencio Avalos, 31, was the first of the miners to ride up the shaft. Wearing sunglasses to protect his eyes from aboveground lights, Avalos squeezed into a specially fitted, bullet-shaped capsule only a shade smaller than the 28-inch diameter of the tunnel and was winched to the surface over 14 agonizing minutes. -- LA TIMES

HALLIE: As I was reading the exhilarating story about the Chilean miners rescue, I was reminded of how few big news stories there are with truly happy endings. Seeing that first guy who came up, hugging his weeping 7-year-old son--doesn't get much better than that. "Trapped in a mine" rarely ends with a successful rescue, never mind 2 months later. Happy endings are usually reserved for our novels.

I tried to remember events in the past that have captured us like that? Remember Baby Jessica who was 18 months old when she fell into an 8-inch pipe and was stuck there for more than 2 days? Radio and TV were riveted as rescuers drilled in sideways to free her and she sang Humpty Dumpty to herself. The banner headline on papers across America: "BABY JESSICA RESCUED."

Or when Elizabeth Smart was found and returned to her family 9 months after she'd been abducted from her bedroom.
What are some of the happy endings you remember?

ROBERTA: Oh my gosh, I LOVE this miner story. Because I've been trying to picture myself trapped down in that black, dusty, hot space for all those days and hoping I'd rise to the occasion. But really not at all sure I'd do as well as those guys. I watched the video Tuesday morning of the first man to surface in that little capsule--amazing! (And just by the way, riding in that little tube would do me in, though I suppose you'd put up with anything at this point when you are deliriously happy to get out!) And I'm so curious about what kinds of long-term psychological effects this will have on them. A lot we'll probably never know.

ROSEMARY: I had just landed at JFK when I saw everyone riveted to the television monitors. It would be three hours before the first man came out but I had to stay up to watch. The second man - Mario Sepulveda - was amazing. He was high fiving the president and handing out rocks. Ye gods,what a great story. BTW, did Larry King really say "I was on Sepulveda Avenue just today"?

I can't say it's not without some negatives, but the Utah hiker who had to cut his own arm off, but survived was one happy ending. And I remember being transfixed by the story of the Uruguayan rugby team that survived the plane crash in the Andes. The survivors just celebrated an anniversary. Wow...they are few and far between aren't they?

RHYS: I have found myself quite weepy over this and I saw that all the hardened media types were teary-eyed too. My favorite happy ending was Apollo 13. I remember watching it live on TV and literally holding my breath for the one and a half minutes that they were out of contact before that capsule appeared in the sky. Years later I saw the movie, and even though I knew it was going to end happily, I still held my breath!

ROSEMARY: Apollo 13...I've seen the movie 8 times and I still get excited when they hear Hanks/Lovell's scratchy voice.

HANK: Oh, of course, Apollo 13. And how about the moon landing? Has there ever been such an amazing event? I still get teary. Yeah, the miners. All those guys, the drillers, being so proud of themselves. And the trapped miners not turning into Lord of the Flies, but all wanting to let their pals go out before them. Two empire state buildings down. Pretty amazing.

HALLIE: News this morning - they're all out!

What happy endings that have stuck with you over the years?