Tagline: Feeling homesick, Olivia agrees to attend her new neighborhood's Fourth of July picnic, but it's a handsome sergeant that sends her spirits soaring.
Stream of consciousness Observations:
That first paragraph...LOL. I have sometimes been asked if I work at the grocery store by strangers and I wonder what about my clothing identifies me as an employee? Usually grocery store employees wear some kind of uniform or name tag. So I'm liking Olivia right off the bat.
Okay, joke's on me! The guy asking the question was teasing her.
Aha, so we've skillfully established that Olivia knows this guy and has a wee crush on him. (I say "wee" because I've been binge-watching Outlander. LOL)
Oh, his name's Noah. Happy sigh!
I really love this part:
His dimpled smile warmed her heart almost as much as the promise.
Notice that the mid-point of the story happens to align with the gutter in the magazine.
Oh, I love a man in uniform.
He has a kid? Uh-oh, that can only mean...yep. There's a mommy. As you'll no doubt realize, this is the black moment of the story, when poor Olivia thinks he's married.
Oh, I absolutely adore this description phrase too...
But when it came time to make her contribution to the picnic, she discovered he was manning the grill (pun intended??? LOL), his dark-lashed cobalt blue eyes rendering her speechless.
The addition of the white hot sausages is genius. It's imperative in Woman's World stories that you include connections between the hero and heroine. The fact that they grew up in adjacent suburbs of New York gives them so many things in common, which consciously or unconsciously gives the reader hope that this couple will find happiness together.
Ha! Palmer totally surprised me. I thought Noah was divorced. Turns out the boy wasn't his.
Oh, that ending was perfection. Fantastic story.
Photo by Steven Depolo via Flickr CC license
4 comments:
I loved, loved, loved this story.
Great job, Betsi.
I agree Kate, this was a fantastic story! Nicely done, Betsi.
This was a great story. I actually had assumed the boy was a nephew. But it made sense since he was in the army that the child belonged to someone who was overseas.
This story gave me a smile. Loved it!
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