byDiana Hickerson from the December 26, 2022 issue
Tagline: Adopting two kittens is Gracie's one Christmas wish, until a handsome stranger steps in and snags one...and steals her heart in the process.
Observations: It can seem like an impossible task--to give the editors the same thing, but different--but it's not. Ms. Hickerson did it by taking a tried-and-true trope I've seen time and again (adopting a pet) and bringing it into the technological age. All it took for this tale was to add a live feed that showed the cats and kittens up for adoption. Voila, you've got an old trope with a fresh spin.
So if you're looking for story inspiration, just take a few moments to think about the leaps and bounds technology has taken in the past decade or so. We can now binge entire seasons of TV shows. Top tier movies sometimes never even go to the theaters. People who never took taxis before are using Uber or Lyft. Online dating is, perhaps, the premier way of meeting singles. We carry around excellent cameras for still photography and video and they fit in our pockets. And we can view the pictures and videos instantaneously. No film or film developing necessary! It's common to be able to literally see who is at your front door. You can have music play in your house just by saying "Alexa, play some jazz." The list goes on and on.
Because Woman's World embraces characters of a certain age, take an older person and combine him or her with something "newfangled" and you've got instant conflict, a problem to solve, a character arc to complete.
Photo by abcrumley via Flickr Creative Commons License
