• Comedy Ain't Easy by Leslie Kelly
• A Day in the Life of a Literary Agent by Linda Hyatt
• Why English is So Tough To Learn...author unknown
• Recipe for Writing a Novel by Mary Alcock (1742-1798)
• Beware the Wabops by Susan Naomi Horton
• Ten Surefire Ways How [NOT!] To Impress and Editor/Agent by Carol J. Stephenson
• STAR’s “Most Romantic List” 2000
• Rules for Writers (author unknown)
• Grammar Check? What the Heck? by Jana J. Turbyfill
• Web Site Recommendations
• STAR News & Sightings
• February Meeting Note

Comedy Ain't Easy

by Leslie Kelly

I don’t consider myself a funny person. I can never remember jokes, I marvel at people who come up with quick comebacks, and I have no special talent for twisting the spoken word. But, for some reason, I can often make people laugh with my writing. (Note: With...not AT!)

I guess it had to happen. I’ve always loved all those Jude Devereux, Judith McNaught, Amanda Quick, and Susan Elizabeth Phillips books. Funny and sexy are my two top requirements in my romance reading. I’m told I do okay on the “sexy” part in my own writing—obviously the editor at Temptation who bought my very first book agreed. So I guess it was natural that I’d want to try my hand at writing funny.

It’s tougher than it sounds. Though I’ve found myself chuckling as I write about some of the antics my characters (usually heroines) get into, I don’t really set out to make jokes or instill my dialogue with one-liners.

When analyzing this unexpected humor, I came to the realization that it always stems from the characters I’ve developed and the situations in which they find themselves. Writing humor in a romance novel doesn’t mean writing jokes. It simply means setting up realistic characters who find themselves in humorous situations, and sitting back to see how they’ll react. As the author, all I do is listen to what they say and write it down.

Take, for example, my newest project, which is currently under consideration at Duets. It started out as a potential Temptation. I wanted to write an amnesia story. A woman is mugged, remembers little to nothing about herself and wakes up in a hospital room full of strangers. Nothing funny, about that, right?

Then I started writing and I realized something. My heroine doesn’t have a real case of amnesia. She remembers who she is. The only problem? The person she remembers being is a comic strip character.

There’s a natural invitation to humor. The story isn’t riddled with jokes, or laugh out loud pitfalls, but the entire situation, and the personality of this heroine (and the hero—who’s the comic strip creator!) make the story funny.

One thing I’ve learned is how closely connected comedy and tragedy really are. Remember that old saying “If I didn’t laugh, I knew I’d cry?” I’ve often found that to be true in novels I’ve read.

Perhaps we’re all conditioned for the tragedy/comedy connection through movies and tv shows. Think about it. The physical comedy of the Three Stooges was pretty horrific. Yet audiences ate it up. How many times did we see Wil E Coyote get blown to bits by whatever gadget he’d ordered from the Acme Company to bring down the Road Runner? And didn’t we always laugh? Someone slips on a banana peel—do we instantly worry that they’ve wrenched their back? Nope. We chuckle even as we roll our eyes at the juvenile humor. Seeing Carol Kane as the whack Bill Murray in the face with a toaster during the holiday classic “Scrooged” always leaves me roaring.

Why? Why do we laugh when we should cry? Why do movies like “There’s Something About Mary” leave us rolling in the aisles when with a different soundtrack—some dark, moody music—we’d be crying out at what happens to the poor dog!

I know why. And I’ll let you in on the secret...It’s all in the delivery. Comedy and tragedy are two sides of the same coin, and just changing the way you present the same story to the audience (or the reader) changes how they will react to it. You set the audience up with the same scenario, but your choice of words as the author, your characters dialogue, the way they dress, the places they go, their thoughts, their physical responses—all these serve as your book’s “soundtrack” to get this one point across to your reader: Laugh with me. Don’t cry.

I’ve read angsty, emotionally draining amnesia stories that read like tragedy. Mine is comedy. How are my readers going to know? Well, the dialogue is a definite tip-off. The way the heroine dresses, the trouble she gets herself into because of things she thinks she’s supposed to be able to do, plus my choice of words and description will serve as the soundtrack to keep my readers in on the joke.

Your characters don’t have to be funny people in order for your story to be funny. Often the most humorous situations arise when normal, straight-laced characters find themselves confronted with their zany soul-mate (like in Stephanie Bond’s classic “Irresistible?”) or when ordinary characters go to extraordinary measures to get out of an untenable situation (like in SEP’s “Lady Be Good”—I’m still laughing over the kiss the oh-so-proper heroine gives the hero’s sister in order to convince an unwanted suitor to take a hike!) There are also main characters who are quirky and don’t even realize it (like most of Amanda Quick’s historical heroines) or stories with perfectly normal main characters who are surrounded by zany secondary characters.

Remember, whatever route you choose, unforced humor that sneaks up on the reader through the soundtrack of your book—the dialogue, setting, inner thoughts and actions—is always going to work better than jokes and one-liners.

And, when all else fails, throw in the old banana peel.

Leslie Kelly’s first book "Night Whispers" was published by Harlequin Temptation in 9/99, won Leslie the "Notable New Author of the Year" award from OV-RWA, and is currently a finalist for "Best Short Contemporary of 1999" in the National Reader’s Choice Awards. Her next book, "Suite Seduction," another light and funny Temptation, will be published in late 2000 as part of the "Wrong Bed" miniseries.