November 2, 2020
Is humor an important element is your stories? Do you ever laugh at something you’ve written?
Once upon a time, I attempted to portray myself as a comedian in a school talent show. It didn’t go well. I’m much older now, and my sense of humor has changed and warped. I’ve learned well from some masters of sexual innuendo and dark humor.
But neither of those work for my Harmony Duprie mysteries. I have to rely on humor of a more subtle persuasion. For example, this selection from The Baron’s Cufflinks:
I take pride in being able to finish every book I start but this one tested my limits. I’d picked it up on a whim, but I couldn’t take the idea of a billionaire vampire dinosaur shifter as a hero seriously. That may have been the point, but I wasn’t in the mood for a romantic farce disguised as a cozy mystery.
Even drunk, I wouldn’t be able to read it, and I couldn’t foist it off on any of my friends with a clear conscience. I wondered if there was time to ditch it in the camper, buried in the bottom cabinet behind the pots and pans. If my friends ever found it, they’d never connect it to me.
Come on, tell me that’s a little funny. But thank heavens, I don’t have to support myself as a stand-up comedian.
The Harmony stories are the perfect tool for a touch of lightheartedness. Her friends believe she takes herself too seriously and try to get her to loosen up. It doesn’t always go well, but they try.
Here’s a quick example of Harmony overthinking life from The Marquesa’s Necklace:
The bus ride home seemed longer than the morning’s trip as I studied each person getting on for a potential threat. Was the little gray-haired lady with the oversize purse and shopping bag packing a handgun? Did the teenage boy wearing a long black coat keep ninja stars in his pockets? And the woman in her mid-twenties holding a little girl’s hand? Was the child was just a prop, borrowed for the afternoon, solely to throw off suspicion? In reality, was the woman a super spy waiting for a chance to drug me and cart me off to her remote hideaway?
The Free Wolves stories are different. There may be moments of humor, but I don’t try to include it as a major part of the books. Like Harmony, the characters in the books take themselves seriously. And for good reason. They’re trying to save their piece of the world.
So, back to Harmony. In The Ranger’s Dogtags, the book in progress, opportunities for humor are slim. I didn’t even try to be funny, and rely on secondary characters to supply breaks from the action. Harmony is in over her head in this story, (more than usual!) and I’ve tried to make the writing reflect that. I’m hoping my readers will forgive me for the change.
About the second half of the question. Do I ever make myself laugh? Truth is, it takes a lot to make me laugh, but next to nothing to make me smile. And yes, Harmony and her friends make me smile. I hope they make the reader smile, too.
I’m hoping Phil is going to throw some outrageous piece of prose at us and make me grin. It’ll be interesting to see what everyone else on this hop shares this week. You can find out by following the links below.
Until next time, stay safe!
November 2, 2020
Is humor an important element is your stories? Do you ever laugh at something you’ve written?
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I’m sure Phil will come up with something quite outrageous, lol.
I’m on my best behavior and left out the potential dangers of Italian squat toilets and by-the-hour motels.
I’m the same way. There’s moments of humor in my books, but I’m not really a humor writer unless it’s satirical.
Your post made me smile, Patricia. I also smile but rarely laugh. I did think your piece was humorous, I like subtle humour.
The stand up routine? That was my job. Not comedy, but if you didn’t have some humor, including self deprecating, you were sunk. My immediate reaction to loud feedback was always “WTF!!” So I’m standing on a big stage doing a m icrophone giveaway at a Maranatha conference. I switch the mic on. SKREEEEEEEEE. The sound guy chokes it back, I do the quick demo. “See what I mean about that five times stronger magnet?” I got off stage the first thing out of my mouth was “Did I say f*&%?” It was a joke for years that my guardian angel was with me on that gig.
So I mostly use situational humor. Keeps me out of the potty mouth stand up routines!
I worry that my guardian angel has given up on me. She’s had to save me too many times.
I figure mine is about worn out. But right on it the day I probably didn’t need to drop an F bomb on 1200 Evangelical and Charismatic music ministers congregated at a mega church in Houston.
I thought it was funny! And now I want a dinosaur shifter romance. Except I worry about the baby that will produce. But then what’s life without some kind of creature emerging out of a womb now and then?
I read an actual story with that premise. (not the baby, that I remember) Then throw in that he was the president of the USA.