Writing humorous fiction

Alexatheauthor · Post by **Alexatheauthor** » 27 Apr 2016, 09:58

I'm just curious about how people who write curious fiction come up with their topics, jokes, inspiration. I know I can be funny in conversation, such as when telling something funny that happened to me, but when it comes to writing it down, I kind of freeze up. My dialogue is probably what suffers the most.

moderntimes · Post by **moderntimes** » 27 Apr 2016, 12:38

A good question because humor is harder to write than serious fiction. If it's serious, you just talk about the murder or battle or car chase and so long as you're reasonably accurate, you can get your message across.

But humor? It's situational and tricky. You can't just write jokes. Those are stale. And humorous situations can be challenging because the author can make it farcical and goofy clown-water-squirting, which may make little kids laugh but not likely adults. So adult humor must be mostly sarcastic, which runs the chance of being rude and nasty.

Dialogue? I regard dialogue as the heartbeat of a novel. Regardless of whether you're writing humor or serious, you must make each character speak with a different "voice" -- use a certain vocabulary, sentence structure, literacy, and so on.

Here's a little excerpt from my new private eye novel. Some cops, my private eye, and a CSI tech are outside the apartment of a horrific murder, so I wanted a bit of humor before I took my reader into the murder scene. A nun was the unlucky person to have found the murder, a grad student at the nearby Roman Catholic university where the nun teaches. She leaves, and this ensues...

One of the CSI techs, a guy named Kenny Phelps, was listening, and frowned. “Sister Mary Frances? A nun? Don’t nuns, like…” He curved both hands around his head, pantomiming a coif.

“You watch too much TV, Kenny, and movies,” I told him. “Nuns in the US haven’t resembled penguins for years. Started during Vatican Two in, ah…” I drew a momentary blank.

Detective Meierhoff immediately took up the slack. “Second Vatican council, nineteen sixty-two, convened by Pope John twenty-three.”

“You’re Jewish,” I said. “How come you know that?”

Meierhoff winked at me. “Keeping up on the competition.”

“So,” Kenny asked. “Nuns now dress like Dana Scully?”

“But with longer hemlines,” I said. “Some still maintain the traditional habit, pun intended.”

There was a brief pause and Meierhoff sighed. “Dana Scully. I sure had a crush on Anderson.”

“Ha!” Kenny laughed. “Tell me what nerd didn’t?”

“I actually think she’s better looking today,” I offered. “Saw her in that Hannibal show on TV.”

“Y’know who I thought was sexier, though?” Kenny remarked. “Mimi, whatzhername, you know, ah, played another FBI gal. Was in Playboy, too.”

“Mimi Rogers, otherwise Mrs. ex-Tom Cruise,” Meierhoff said.

Kenny chuckled. “Meierhoff’s right, Cruise it is. Ya gotta keep an eye on Meierhoff here, Mitch. He’s up to date on Hollywood, reads all the murder mysteries, downloads CSI episodes so he can compare what we do with TV. He’s so very helpful that way.” Kenny smiled, jerking Meierhoff’s chain. “Ol’ Sergeant Meierhoff’s real smart, a regular Brainiac.”

“Not a good analogy,” Meierhoff said. “Brainiac is actually a malevolent alien entity that attacks the Earth, tries to kill Superman and other superheroes. In Frank Miller’s graphic novel Dark Knight Strikes Again, Brainiac—”

“Whoa,” Captain Duggan interrupted, his arms raised. “Hold on. Can we back off the trivia a while and stop talking like we’re in a Quentin friggin' Tarantino movie? There’s a murder investigation, in case you’ve all forgotten.”

I had this oddball conversation straight off the top of my head, no other sources. I tried to place myself there, listening in on this goofy conversation, and then jotting it down, revising until it was just right. I wanted to bring a smile to the readers and hopefully I succeeded.

Alexatheauthor · Post by **Alexatheauthor** » 27 Apr 2016, 14:04

This is a very good example, and I agree. If you read a text and all of the characters sound like the same person, you have to provide the characters with a background so you can see how each one speaks. Whenever I have acted, we were always asked to give the character a background. I can see that with your dialogue. It's also important to add some humor with heavy subjects. You can't bombard your audience with so much drama.

moderntimes · Post by **moderntimes** » 27 Apr 2016, 15:26

I review mystery novels for another website, and so I read dozens of them. Occasionally I'll come across a book where everyone sounds the same. Not only that, but if 2 characters are having a discussion, one will make a long statement, complex sentences, like he was reading a prepared speech. And no interruptions. Then he'll be quiet and the other person will make a long reply with the exact same word structure and syntax. Nobody talks that way.

Humor aside, when you write dialogue you must have each character have a unique rhythm, sentence structure, word choice, educational level, all the subtle differences. For humor, it can often be more challenging, because you must make the reader smile as well as convey information.

-- 28 Apr 2016, 12:14 --

Let me further talk about humor. Even in serious books (murder mysteries, thrillers, etc) a bit of sarcasm and wit helps with the rhythm of the overall story.

Shakespeare knew this perfectly. Look at the cranky gatekeeper scene in Macbeth, right after the severe sleepwalk scene. And his delightful gravedigger scene in Hamlet, not to mention all the sarcasm poked at the royal adviser, Polonius.

By changing the tempo and rhythm of the story, adding a bit of humor, you can control the pacing and movement of the whole novel.

Alexatheauthor · Post by **Alexatheauthor** » 28 Apr 2016, 12:37

This has been very helpful. Thanks!

moderntimes · Post by **moderntimes** » 28 Apr 2016, 12:48

Glad to help. As for the actual writing, I recommend that you imaging you're sitting among these characters and are "taking dictation" of what they say. You're the omniscient observer. If you imagine real people having a conversation, it will easier to create their dialogues.

Alexatheauthor · Post by **Alexatheauthor** » 28 Apr 2016, 12:51

I may be overthinking it. Usually, when I get started it's tough, but once I hit a flow I can shape it into something useful.

moderntimes · Post by **moderntimes** » 28 Apr 2016, 19:06

Humorous or not, dialogue is critical, and must sound realistic.

When I first started writing fiction, I tried to make my characters behave as marionettes as I tried to force them to say things. And of course, the result was flat and lifeless.

Then I began to become the invisible scribe, create realistic characters and put them into a room or situation, and then sit back and take dictation. This is how I work it.

Of course, the ol' brain is still doing all the actual work, but imagining that I was just listening to other people speaking created the separation in my mind required for having individual "human beings" and not puppets.

joefowler · Post by **joefowler** » 02 May 2016, 14:05

Humor comes naturally to me. My problem is writing dialogue that is serious. It is more my personality to joke and be sarcastic(funny sarcastic, not mean sarcastic). I also try to use running jokes throughout a book sometimes. One of my characters was a half demon-werewolf hybrid with a really spooky voice. I used his voice as a joke to lighten the mood throughout that book.

Alexatheauthor · Post by **Alexatheauthor** » 03 May 2016, 12:05

Humor is tricky because some people in the audience may not get the references. I noticed that with Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt. A lot of jokes rely on knowing a lot about pop culture for a show like that.