HO-HO-HO! Funny You Should Say That … Or Putting Humor in Our Writing!

 

A joyful heart is good medicine,

but a crushed spirit dries up the bones.

— Proverbs 17:22

I don’t know about you youngsters out there, but at the ripe old age of 67, the last thing I want is dry bones! Had my bone density a while back and I’m just a hair shy of normal (my bones, mind you, not my personality!), so I cannot risk reading depressing, dry, slice-of-life books. Frankly I’m a Calgon-take-me-away type of gal who, come to think of it, has dry skin as well. Bottom line? The older we get, the less there is to laugh about, which is exactly why we need humor in our writing!

Especially this time of year when holiday stress can take its toll. So, l thought this was the appropriate time to update one of my favorite blogs from the past about humor to put a little HO-HO-HO in our writing.

 🎄WHY INFUSE HUMOR IN YOUR WRITING?🎄

1.) HUMOR CAN SET THE TONE OF YOUR BOOK OR CHARACTERS:  Mary Connealy’s Calico Canyon is about a teacher who, in the process of attempting to tame five hellion little boys and their pa, accidentally ends up as a ma and wife to them instead. I'm sure you'll agree that the first line of this true Connealy classic sets the mood for the entire book, which is a light and humorous read.

 The five horsemen of the Apocalypse rode in. Late as usual.
—Calico Canyon, Mary Connealy

Next, in book 1 of my Isle of Hope series, Isle of Hope Unfailing Love, I wanted to not only clue the readers in as to the what the story was about (a former wild girl/now a woman of faith who returns to her hometown after eight years to make amends to the father she defied, the boyfriend she deserted, and the best friend she betrayed), but I wanted to add a little humor to lighten the subject.

 When it comes to burning bridges, I am the Queen of Kerosene.
—Isle of Hope, Julie Lessman

Now, it’s no secret I am a first-line freak (see my Seeker blog entitled The Perfect Pickup Line ... Or How to Hook a Reader!), but when you can slap a little humor in that first line, to me, it’s pure Nirvana, such as in the excellent following examples:

If there was one thing Josie knew, it was the smell of a rich man. 

And whoever had just walked into the diner smelled like Fort Knox.

 —Her Unlikely Family, Missy Tippens

Unemployed. Single. And out of brownie mix.  

                         —A Valentine’s Wish, Betsy St. Amant

 2.) HUMOR CAN ENDEAR YOUR CHARACTERS TO YOUR READER AND PROVIDE A CHARACTER DEPTH THAT FEELS NORMAL, NATURAL, AND INVITING. In this scene from A Love Surrendered, Charity O’Connor is the “quirky” sister who provides most of the comic relief in the series, which helps to make the family “feel” so

much more fun and close like a family should be.

“Ouch.” Steven grinned, biceps taut as he folded his arms. “Poor Mitch—bet that hurt.”

“Not as much as it hurt Henry. Mitch went off like a rocket’s red glare. Haven’t seen the love of my life lose it like that since …” She paused to think, head cocked and hand to mouth. “Well, I guess since yesterday when he cut his face with the razor I used on the neighbor’s dog.” She scrunched her nose and shivered. “Beggar’s lice and skunk. Don’t ask—it’s not pretty.”

3.) HUMOR CAN BRING BALANCE AND COMIC RELIEF TO A SERIOUS SCENE: In the following scene from A Heart Revealed, the heroine Emma Malloy is devastated by something that has happened to her, which in turn devastates the hero Sean O’Connor who is in love with her. To lighten the tone of what is a very serious last quarter of the book, I layered humor into this heartbreaking situation by having Charity O’Connor, the quirky busy-body of the family, try to weasel information out of her brother . Note the heavy use of stoically comical facial expressions/humorous posture on the hero’s part combined with Charity’s relentless probing regarding her best friend Emma. 

She tapped her foot on the leafy pavement. “Something’s up, Sean, I can feel it in my bones, and so help me I will badger you all the way home if you don’t spill it now.”

His frustration blasted out in a cloud of smoke. “I can’t tell you, Charity, I promised.”

“Oh, fiddle, that’s an easy fix. I’ll just ask the questions, and you give me that stone-face look of yours that will tell me everything I need to know.”

“But that’s not right.”

“Sure it is,” she said, dismissing his concern with a wave of her hand. “I do it with Mitch all the time.” Head cocked, she chewed on her lip. “Okay, it’s something that happened at work, but it has to be personal because Emma’s steady as a rock in all business matters, right?”

He stared, trying not to blink.

“Okay, good, a personal situation at work that involves a person other than you.”

His jaw dropped. “I never said that.”

“Sure you did, when you did that pinching thing with your nose as a stall tactic.”

He crossed his arms to his chest, emotional battlement to ward off the enemy.

“Now ... let’s see,” she said, finger to her chin. “Somebody upset Emma pretty badly, which means it has to be someone who doesn’t work at the store.”

“Why?” he asked in exasperation, his patience as thin as his energy.

Charity blinked. “Why? Because the woman who bolted up my steps was as pale as death,” she said, enunciating slowly as if explaining something to Henry. “Which means it has to be someone she feels threatened by, and that rules out everyone at Dennehy’s.”

His lips compressed.

She gave him a quick nod and started to pace, head down and arms folded. “Okay, so it has to be an outsider she’s afraid of and probably a man.” She halted mid-stride, eyes spanning wide. “Wait, it’s not that bum who beat her up, is it? You know, her neighbor’s boyfriend?”

Swallowing his discomfort, he gave her a blank stare, facial muscles relaxing.

She blew out a sigh of relief. “Oh, good. For a second there, I was worried.”

“How the devil do you do that?” he said in a choke, lips parted in shock.

She tapped a finger to her head. “Stone face, remember?” Her mouth flattened. “ It’s a gift—honed to perfection by Mitch Dennehy.”

 4.) HUMOR PROVIDES CONTRAST TO DRAMA, DEEPENING THE EFFECT OF BOTH IN A STORY:  I personally love to sprinkle in short, dramatic one- or two-word sentences/thoughts in my writing, but if I put them in every paragraph, they would lose their effect since there is no contrast to give them punch. It’s the same with humor and drama—a mix of each provides contrast to sharpen both your prose and your story.

In this scene from A Passion Most Pure, the heroine Faith O’Connor meets her manager Mitch Dennehy for the first time, an encounter that is both dramatic and traumatic for her. Upon introduction, Mitch proceeds to bait and pick on Faith, so to play up the drama, I incorporated traces of humor (i.e. analogy of the blush of her cheeks spreading like blight in the rainy season and comparing Faith’s tension to straddling a mule about to buck rather than a horse since a mule is more comical). I think the slight touch of humor helps to sharpen the delivery of a dramatic and hard-hitting punchline that not only puts her bully of a manager in his place, but conveys the message that she will not tolerate ridicule.

Mitch didn’t say a word, only eyed her with practiced superiority, and the blush on her cheeks spread like blight in the rainy season. Michael watched in fascination as a smile fluttered on his department editor’s lips. Mitch’s penetrating blue eyes drifted from the tiny hands pinched white in Faith’s lap, to the soft tendril of hair that curved the nape of her neck.

There was no mercy in Mitch’s smile. “Michael tells me you were a copywriter at The Boston Herald, is that right?”

Faith hesitated, then sucked in a shaky breath. “Yes, I mean I did write some copy …”

Mitch nodded. His cocky smile worked its way into a grin. “Some copy? Have you done any feature writing before?” He was waiting. They were all waiting.

The hot stain on her cheeks infected the tips of her ears. “No, I haven’t done much feature writing, exactly …”

“Any reviews, editorials, hard news?”

She tensed as if straddling a mule about to buck. “No, I’m afraid I don’t have much experience doing any of that …”

“Well, then, Miss O’Connor,” he mused, his eyes laughing at her, “Tell me. Is there anything you can do?”

The air stilled to a deathly hush. Slowly, she lifted her chin to stare at him with as much defiance as she could politely display. “Yes sir …” she said, producing a smile that was anything but, “I can be on time.” 

🎄22 WAYS TO INFUSE HUMOR INTO YOUR WRITING🎄

There are dozens of simple ways to incorporate humor in your stories such as good word choice (i.e. the example above in point 4 where I use the word “mule” instead of the more expected “horse” in the phrase “straddling a mule about to buck”), as well as exaggerated emphasis with punctuation such as ellipses and dashes, pacing, timing, silence, facial and body gestures, etc.

That said, following are a number of favorite ways I like to inject humor in my writing, but today we will only cover the first three of twenty-two points, points A, B, and C, which are  prequel points to my original Part 1 blog post. 

NOTE: To spare you a ridiculously LONG post, points 1- 4 can be found in Part 1 HERE (simply scroll down to where the points are listed mid-blog) and points 6-19 can be found in Part 2 HERE. 

Ready? Here we go on points A, B, and C … 

A.) Pick Character Name To Infuse Humor

B.) Slapstick Activity

C.) Humorous Thoughts/Internal Monologue

1.) Analogy/Metaphor/Simile

2.) Facial Features

3.) Pun

4.) Sarcasm

5.) Jokes and Quips

6.) Slapstick Dialogue/Internal Monologue

7.) Serious Subject/Humorous Take

8.) Play on Words

9.) Scene Set-Up

10.) Self-Deprecation

11.) Sibling Rivalry

12.) Quirky Personality

13.) Fib

14.) Name Calling

15.) Alliteration

16.) Props

17.) Shock

18.) David and Goliath Factor

19.) Kids

A.) CHOOSE CHARACTER NAMES YOU CAN USE FOR HUMOR:  Since my latest novel, For Love of Liberty, is a romantic comedy about a hero and heroine who butt heads, I purposely chose a hero name — Griffin McShane — that the heroine could make fun of, which she does quite frequently, referring to him as Griffin McVain, Griffin McShame, Griffin McPain, and Griffin McBlame. Here's a sample, which I hope highlights the humor and fun in store for both the characters and the readers.

“Abominable.”

Miss Willoughby’s voice rang clear and concise from the back of the schoolroom, spelling primer in hand as she offered fourteen-year-old Liberty “Libby” O’Shea an encouraging smile. “Since everyone has been eliminated from the spelling bee except you and Mr. McShane, Miss O’Shea, we’ll need both the definition and usage of the word in a sentence in addition to the spelling, all right?”

“Yes, ma’am.” Libby’s smile tightened, the presence of seventeen-year-old Griffin McShane a few feet away girding her with the resolve to put the cocky know-it-all in his place. “Abominable,” she repeated in a loud voice, her mind immediately tracking to the most appropriate definition: Griffin McVain.

She cleared her throat. “A-b-o-m-i-n-a-b-l-e. Definition: something unpleasant, disagreeable, repulsive, disgusting, loathsome, nauseating, insufferable, despicable, and horrible. Sentence usage …” She bit back the squirm of a smile. Griffin McShane is an abominable rogue. Shoulders square, she notched her chin up. “Spilling ink on a classmate’s term paper is an abominable thing to do.”

I believe in making my character names do double duty. Such as in my series Isle of Hope and my latest book in that series, His Steadfast Love, in which I chose the name Katherine Marie O'Bryen for the heroine, who is a sarcastic type with a temper. But since fishing off a dock is a big part of this series, I changed the spelling to Catherine so I could have her brother coin the nickname "Catfish" for the “chatty twin with a big mouth as bristly as a catfish.” Extra humorous mileage I was able to build in. 

B.) SLAPSTICK ACTIVITY: The movie McLintock with John Wayne and Maureen O'Hara is one of my favorites because I'm of the age and era where humorous head-butting and manhandling in movies was in vogue (i.e. John Wayne carrying Maureen O'Hara through the streets of a Western town in her chemise in McLintock or Rock Hudson storming Doris Day's apartment to carry her in her pajamas through the streets in Pillow Talk). It was light and funny slapstick activity, which is what I tried to do in my latest novel, For Love of Liberty. The trick, I think, is to allow humor to soften what would normally be outrageous manhandling to heighten the head-butting in a Taming of the Shrew type of plot. Here's a clip from For Love of Liberty to show you what I mean:

“Oh, no you don’t, mister.” Launching herself forward, Liberty spurted around him, arms pasted to the jambs to block his way. “We are going to finish this conversation.”

“Over-my-dead-body,” he growled, heating more than her cheeks when he rudely plucked her up by the waist and set her aside so hard, she wobbled.

“Oh—good idea!” She tripped him with her foot, biting back a smile when he flailed like a puppet before regaining his balance. “But first we’re going to talk, you … you … ill-mannered mule!”

“Okay, that’s it.” A squeak left her lips while her body took flight, her squeal quickly lost in an unladylike grunt when he tossed her over his shoulder like a sack of feed. “And I’ve never met a mule with manners, Miss Bell, but if I do, I’ll be sure to send him over to give you some tips. Del, I’ll be back shortly.” He slammed the door hard, drawing the attention of several men who issued jovial greetings as they passed, their low chuckles broiling her cheeks all the more.

“Put me down right now!” she hissed, wiggling and pummeling his back with her free hand while she clutched her purse with the other. Passing the mercantile next door, she noted the dropped jaws of several well-dressed women. Another rush of blood scorched her face, both from anger and the humiliation of hanging upside down like a bat. “Let-me-down-this-instant!” she gritted out with renewed fury, battering him all the harder. “You are acting like a complete barbarian!”

“Well, no surprise there.” He stomped down the wooden sidewalk, locking her legs against his chest when she tried to kick him. “What do you expect from somebody who starves babies and women—chivalry?”

“Ha!” she shouted, banging shoulders that felt like boulders while she commenced to bashing his head with her purse. “You wouldn’t know the meaning of chivalry if Daniel Webster personally defined it for you, you … you … overgrown bully!”

“No, but I sure can spell it, lady, along with royal pain in the—”

“Afternoon, Finn.” A man offered a casual tip of his hat, continuing on down the boardwalk as if Finn McShane manhandling a woman were an everyday occurrence.

C.) HUMOROUS THOUGHTS/INTERNAL MONOLOGUE: One of the easiest ways to add humor in a story is through a character's thoughts or internal monologue. Here are some examples to show you what I mean:

— For Love of Liberty by Julie Lessman

       Martha gently brushed the blue ribbon, a look of awe shining on her face. “I honestly didn’t think we’d stand a chance since Finn’s booth is so amazing, but I’m overjoyed we did.” She looped her arm through Liberty's. “What are you going to do with your share of the award money, Libby?”

      Hire a gunslinger.

— Love at Any Cost by Julie Lessman

A grin inched across his face as his eyes slowly trailed back up as naturally as the dimples that deepened with the lift of his smile. Heat suffused her cheeks, as much from the obscene number of petticoats Mother’d insisted she wear as the Romeo’s frank perusal. Flattery will get you nowhere, mister. Her lips took a slant. Though it’d certainly gotten Mark’s ring on her finger. She issued a silent grunt. A history lesson unto itself, she thought, the smell of horse manure from buggies lining the terminal oddly comforting.

And appropriate.

Okay, that’s it—our first three points A, B, and C in this prequel post. And trust me—you don’t want to miss the next four points in my original post, Funny You Should Say That Part 1 and the subsequent post that finishes this series up, Funny You Should Say That Part 2 because they are FUN!! 

Giveaway:   

Leave a comment and humor tips of your own if you like, humorous samples of yours or other writers, or just the name of humorous authors you enjoy, and you will be entered to win an e-copy of my latest novel, For Love of Liberty or your choice of any of my indie e-books.

Hugs,

Julie