Interesting Article

I just wanted to pass along this wonderful article by Karen Rinaldi, describing a refreshing way to look at writing.

A Budding Romance

by Marti Attoun from the May 20, 2019 issue

Tagline: With spring in full bloom, the last thing on backyard gardener Jeannette's mind is love..until handyman Paul shows up and gives her butterflies.

Stream of Consciousness Observations:

I get a strong cheerful vibe from Jeannette in the first paragraph. This is very much what the entire publication is about--looking for the positive, enjoying life.

Second paragraph, we get the information that she's an older lady--old enough to have a grandson. It's a good idea to get this across early in the story, because if you wait too long, the reader will already have established an age in her mind and will need to regroup if it doesn't jive with the character's actual age. For instance, let's pretend we didn't know she was older. Let's say we get all the way to the end of the story and find out she's ninety when all along we thought in our heads that she was in her thirties or forties. Suddenly, we're ejected out of the story, which isn't ideal.

LOL at this line:

Worse, she'd been caught babbling to her blossoms.

I love the alliteration there, too.

Okay, I love this part:

...as Paul took a long admiring look at her colorful backyard, Jeanette snuck a long admiring look at Paul.

Super cute, even though there should be commas between long and admiring.

I'm wondering what a whirligig bumblebee is.

Okay, I see now that it's some kind of wind-powered garden device.

I like how the author compares Jeannette to the flying zebra. Very cute.

We get a summary "telling" part where we summarize what happens over a certain time period. I feel this is a handy tool to utilize when you want to transition to the third act, if you're following a three-act structure for your story.

I love Paul's line about not being in high school but how he feels like he is. I find myself wanting to poke Jeannette in the arm and say, "Don't let this one get away."

Oh, a stealthy hand-holding! Okay. It is true that I have had trouble with the characters holding hands in other stories. Sometimes it feels like it happens too fast for two people just having met, but for some reason, it doesn't bother me here. I tried to look back and find the latest story in which the hand-holding bothered me, but I couldn't find it. If someone can point it out to me, I'll be happy to look at both stories to try to figure out what made it okay for me in this story but not in the other.

The ending is just as cheerful as the beginning.

Photo by Mulberry24 via Flickr cc license

Mother Knows Best

by Elizabeth Palmer from the May 13, 2019 issue

Tagline: Tracy's convinced she'll never find love...until her boss, Wanda, works her motherly magic!

Observations: This story featured a couple of Woman's World tropes--the matchmaker and the mistaken identity--and did them well. If you're a regular reader of the 5-minute romances, you will probably have had an aha! moment like I did when you read this:

A few months ago, I'd helped her set up a profile on a dating website and she'd recently announced that she'd found "the one," promising me I'd finally get to meet him tonight.

I immediately assumed "the one" was for Tracy and not for Wanda and that this was a matchmaker story. I was so wrong! And I love that. I've been reading these stories faithfully for so long that it's very hard to surprise me, and Palmer totally did. The mistaken identity trope showed up when Tracy supposed the handsome stranger to be a con man and her treatment of him when she meets him later in person is hilarious.

I liked how his hand brushed hers and that he didn't take it into his. If you see two people above the age of 13 holding hands in public, it signals that they're a couple, right? To me, the person initiating the act signals that he or she wants to be more than just friends. The person who allows it confirms that they share the same feeling.

So, my personal preference in romance writing is to view holding hands as a milestone. It's a very soft and subtle, but significant, milestone, but a milestone just the same. A certain amount of time must pass and a rapport must be established before a couple holds hands. Crossing this delicate line shows that the relationship is moving forward.

This was another great story from one of the most prolific Woman's World romance writers.

Photo credit: Liz West (Flickr cc license)

The Art of New Love

by Heather Black from the May 6, 2019 issue

Tagline: When retiree Joni Carter visits the Blue Ridge Mountain overlook, she's looking forward to a quiet spring afternoon of sketching the incredible vista. But when a charming painter named Richard comes along, Joni feels a new sense of hope blossom in her heart.

Observations: I liked this story. The surprise of the drawing at the end was unusual. I laughed at the name of the one-eared cat.

I had a few nitpicks about word choice. Of course I did. LOL

"I'm Richard," he said, a twinkle flashing in his eyes.

No need for the word flashing, IMHO. A twinkle is a twinkle. Flashing is more abrupt and slightly more intense. A twinkle is gentle and flirty.

"Something to remember me by," he said, meeting her gaze knowingly.

Why knowingly? To me, that makes it seem as if he knows she's interested in him and will follow him to D.C., which comes across as slightly condescending.

How completely he'd captured her soul in just a few strokes...

I'd have preferred personality rather than soul. 

But again, I did like this story. :)

Photo by Pat (Cletch) Williams via Flickr cc license

Time for Change

by Jeanne Moore from the April 29, 2019 issue

Tagline: As the annual spring festival starts in Serenity Shores, love is the last thing widow Arabella Reilly is looking for, but a handsome traveler may just change her mind.

Observations: This was a cute story. We have a curmudgeonly old woman discover that she is open to finding romance after all. I feel hopeful for them at the end of the tale. I really liked this sentence:

Their eyes met, and a flutter of understanding passed between them.

However, I had some difficulties with the mechanics, all of which are just my opinion.

Like "she sells sea shells by the seashore," Spring Sea Spree is hard to say, even in my head. When I have to stumble over something, it interrupts the flow of the story. But maybe it was just me.

I felt the three colons in the story weren't necessary and (sorry!) a little off-putting. Again, maybe it's just me, but I feel colons belong in term papers (or on blogs! LOL), not in short fiction stories. Two of them were also punctuated incorrectly. There is no capital letter after the colon.

I had trouble with this sentence as well:

"So..." Arabella began, trying to tame her beating heart.

This is nitpicky, but Arabella is alive, so of course her heart is beating. Maybe the author meant that her heart was doing something more than just beating. Racing, maybe? Galloping?

Finally, this story illustrated something that I've seen Woman's World characters do ever since I started reading the magazine, and it makes me grit my teeth every time. A person cannot smile, grin, laugh, beam, or giggle words. Here is an excellent Writer's Digest article on the subject. I encourage all beginning writers to read this.

https://www.writersdigest.com/editor-blogs/there-are-no-rules/keep-it-simple-keys-to-realistic-dialogue-part-ii

The article also mentioned something I highly recommend, which is reading your story aloud. This is an excellent hack to utilize when revising your story. It's amazing how you can hear mistakes that you don't catch when you're reading silently. Reading aloud is also an excellent way to find out if your dialogue sounds stilted and unnatural.

I know it seems as if I hated this story, but I truly didn't. The bones of a good story were there and I finished reading it feeling optimistic for Arabella and Morgan. I was just tripped up by a few details.

Photo by Evgeniy Isaev (via Flickr CC license)