Top 5 – Humor pt 1

Top 5 ways to add humor to your writing. I know I’m saying top 5, but I’m really lying. There are far more than 5 ways to add humor, and each on varies depending on your style. Not everyone likes the same humor when they read, and not everyone is great at the same humor when they write. These examples, and the next 5 I intend to post next week, are just a few options for adding humor and while they might work for some, they won’t work for everyone. Find your inspiration and have fun, because you can’t find things funny if you aren’t having fun.

1 Strange normalcy

Treat the very strange as completely normal. It’s the whole “straight man” concept. The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy is a perfect example of this type of humor. I’ll give you an example you might hear from your eight year old.

Dan walked into a bar with a frozen turkey under one arm.

“Hello Dan.” John said, eying the chilly bird. “What’s with the turkey?”

“I got it for Mr Gobbles. He’s been lonely for days now, and the pet store was out.”

“You staying for a drink?”

“Nah. I’ve got introductions to make.”

John nodded. “Ah, lovebirds.”

2 Word choice

Crapola, hodgepodge, titmouse.  These words are funny. If you make amusing word choices, the scene will be that much funnier.

So, from now on: He’s not fat, he’s corpulent. It’s not a ridiculous story, it’s a cockamamie tale. You’re not shocked, you’re flabbergasted.

3 Be different

Switching up old cliches or metaphors can add humor. Change the beginning or the ending. Try mixing two together and see what can happen. Have fun with it. You never know when you might strike gold.

“He’s obviously a few sandwiches short of a speedboat.”  “A bird in the hand is worth an apple a day.” “An idle mind keeps the doctor away.” “The early worm catches the bird.”

4 Repeat yourself

If it’s funny, don’t let it go until it’s not funny anymore.  Scrubs, Friends, and several other long running comedy shows have a lot of running humor gags. If done well, running gags can really up the funny. You could choose to mention a strange normalcy again and again. You could continue mixing cliches or metaphors. Anything that’s funny.

Dan nods at John as he heads through the throng of writing twenty-year-old kids, all doing their own renditions of an old man with his back thrown out.

“So, how did Mr. Gobble like his new girlfriend?” John handed Dan a beer.

“You know what they say, a turkey under the arm is worth two in the bush.”

“Of course.” John said, lifting his own beer for a drink.

5 Look again

Don’t be afraid to go back and add humor. Those of us who aren’t a laugh a minute, and even those who are, could stand to up the funny in our funny scenes. Adding more later doesn’t mean you’re not funny. It’s just a great way to ensure that there’s something funny for everyone. Besides, it never hurts to add humor… Well, except when your stomach hurts, your eyes tear, and you nearly pee your pants. but that’s the best kind of humor.

Those are my Top 5 ways to add humor to your manuscript. Now, go forth and spread the funny.

Robin Delany

Heat, Humor, and Heart,

Whatever the Century.

Just Write It

By Kay Springsteen

Hooker with a heart of gold meets rich man who rescues her from the streets: A lighthearted look at the life of a prostitute who hits the big time and then turns around to rescue the man who rescued her. Pretty Woman is one of those movies I love to watch. I don’t care that it’s older, or that the premise is extremely far-fetched. It’s fiction. It doesn’t have to make sense. And the interactions of the characters is amazing, as is the job the actors themselves do of portraying this complex group of people. Pretty Woman is billed as a romantic comedy, but did you know it didn’t start out that way?

The screenplay for this movie was originally written as a highly emotional, somewhat dark trip through the world of prostitution, an examination of the differences in class. The dead body in the opening of the movie originally played a much more prominent role and there were no funny snails at dinner scenes, lazy days in the park or quarter of a million dollar necklaces for trips to the opera. The story was seedy and gritty and heavy.

But the producers saw more potential in the story than that. By turning it to a romantic comedy they played to what the audiences of 1990 wanted. Pure, fun escapism. But not so much of an escape they couldn’t dream of that romantic rescue happening to them.

Add in an already established hit song by Roy Orbison, and you have audience appeal.

But what does that have to do with people who are writing fiction today? Everything. The plot of Pretty Woman was only loosely reminiscent of the original. But the author, J.F. Lawton, worked with the studio and producers and agreed to the changes that shot that movie to one of the most successful romantic comedies ever.

And?

Oh right, the lesson. Well, the lesson is simply to be flexible. Write what calls to your heart while you’re in the creative stages, but don’t write with a closed mind, and when you type that last word, don’t let it be written in stone. You never know who might come along with an idea of tweaking your story just enough to make it one of the highest grossing romantic comedies of its time. With a handful of tweaks, you might find yourself sitting on “the next big thing.”

All because an editor or a publisher or… a producer… says to you, “I really like your story but would you be willing to make a few changes…?”

So…would you? Or do you feel J.F. Lawton should have stuck to the original script?

I write highly emotional-charged stories. I don’t do romantic comedy nearly as well as I write drama. But if Hollywood called and asked me to change one into a romantic comedy, would I allow it? In a heartbeat. Time enough later to be a prima donna. First you gotta get to the top.

“You can bend the rules plenty once you get to the top, but not while you’re trying to get there. And if you’re someone like me, you can’t get there without bending the rules.” (Melanie Griffith as Tess  McGill, Working Girl)

Happy reading and writing!

Kay

5 Great Lines from Blood Promise by Richelle Mead

5 Great Lines from Blood Promise by Richelle Mead

1

“You forgot another lesson: Never turn your back until you know your enemy
is dead. Looks like we’ll have to go over the lesson again the next time
I see you—which will be soon.
Love, D.”

2

“You’ve asked me out tons of times.”

“Not really. I’ve made inappropriate suggestions and frequently pushed for nudity. But I’ve never asked you out on a real date. And, if memory serves, you did say you’d give me a fair chance once I let you clean out my trust fund.”

“I didn’t clean it out,” I scoffed.

3

“This is very domestic of you,” he said. “It’s kinda hot, really. Giving me all sorts of fantasies about you in an apron vacuuming my house.”

4

“P.P.S. Just because I like you, it doesn’t mean I still don’t think you’re an evil creature of the night. You are.”

5

“We need to be together.”
“Why?” I asked softly. The word was carried away on the wind, but he heard.
“Because I want you.”
I gave him a sad smile, wondering if we’d meet again in the land of the dead. “Wrong answer,” I told him.


Ava Delany
The Fetish Club Series, The Homecoming Series, and The Beginnings Series.- on Kindle, Allromanceebooks, and many other places where ebooks are sold.
Look for my newest release- Dark Daze – Coming in June 2012.

Top 5 – Before Submitting

Top 5 things to check for before submitting to agents, editors, critique partners, and even your Mom. (Though she will love it either way.)

I always remember these with this simple acronym – RRSRT… Okay, so maybe that’s not so easy to remember. All right you can think of that sound people make when they… No, that doesn’t work… Oh, just read the list. *pout*

1 Reread

Be sure you have looked over your wrok. You don’t want too frustrate those you depend on most for your writing carrier with simple mistakes, and chance loosing them

2 Repetition

Delete repetitive words, because repeating words can feel very repetitive when reading the words that are repeated.

3 Show

Hannah sat on the couch,crossed her legs , and rested her laptop on her thighs. She typed in the first line of chapter 7, then grimaced. Clenching her teeth, she hovered a finger over the delete key. She’d broken rule number 3 on Robin Delany’s top 5. She hit the delete key, removing the offending sentence. “Jane felt angry and frustrated.”

4 Research

James Hainsworthy, third Earl of Jarwood, paused before jumping down from the carriage. He leaned against the cool wood of the door. He hadn’t spoken to Keesha in weeks. Several deep breaths later, he pulled his jacket lower over his pants. The door opened at the first squeak of his sneakers on the stairs, and he smiled at his lady love.

“Forsooth, milady, thou lookest beauteous this morn.”

“You look hot too, baby.”

(If you don’t know what’s wrong with this passage, you should be researching right now. Yes, you should research even if you don’t write historical romance. Don’t make me write another example, ’cause I will. I’ll get all example-y on your hinders.)

5 Think

Author A – I love how your heroine hates dolphins. It’s such a great quirk. Oh, and that little doll she keeps in her room is so interesting. What does it mean?

Author B – Mean? The things in the story should mean something?

Author A – Not necessarily, but I’m sure you are trying to tell the reader something, or hint at your heroine’s past, right?

Author B – *stare’s blankly*

Author A – *wincing* Give an interesting contrast to her personality?

Author B – What?

Author A – You do know about your story world, don’t you? Your character? Her life?

Author B – Why would I need to know about my story world? And who cares about the character’s life? Why would I need to know those things?

Author A – No reason, I guess. *eyebrows rise and Author A begins to whistle*

Those are my Top 5 things you should do before submitting. I hope you enjoyed them and maybe even found them a little helpful.

Robin Delany

Heat, Humor, and Heart,

Whatever the Century.

Bri Clark Talks About Social Media

You can’t turn around these days without hearing the name of the most popular social media sites around. And new sites are added every day. Some catch on, some do not. But whatever your favorite social sites, I’m sure we can all agree on one thing: The Internet has made the world infinitely smaller. Celebrities and other public figures have a vastly increased reach by simply posting status updates. People who follow public figures get to experience a sense of intimate connection that cannot be gained from attending concerts, watching entertainment shows, or reading magazines.

As relatively new authors, we may not have reached the level of notoriety of musical geniuses Bruce Springsteen or Bon Jovi, and our books may not consistently sit in bookstores rubbing jackets with Nora Roberts and Linda Howard. But we have readers, people who recognize our names. We often have a public face and a private one. And it is important to many of us that we keep our private lives out of the public eye. It might be something as small as a desire to maintain mystique over our age or our day jobs or to hold onto a bit of privacy regarding our families—significant others and children. Or maybe we don’t want to admit we were nerds growing up.

And the thing is, we shouldn’t have to. But for some reason, once we hit social media and our friends and family hit it with us, we  are open for secrets to be spilled that we otherwise might prefer to remain…well secret. Perhaps we’re in our fifth marriage and would rather not have the world know our first four went bust. Maybe as an author and an editor, I don’t want the world to know my writing/editing shortcomings. Everyone has things in their past and present that they’d rather not have the public tearing apart. For some reason, though, once we get to a level of public interaction, our friends and family sometimes don’t understand we’ve reached a cutoff point where it’s no longer acceptable to drop certain things into a conversation. And while it’s true they aren’t always aware of our personal/public boundaries, it’s frustrating that they just make assumptions that it is okay to keep on with business as usual, and to mention things like children, or a painful past is airing laundry in public that the person wants kept private.

How to handle this. It’s not nearly as easy as you might think. You don’t want certain information “out there,” but you can’t always rely on the boundaries of family/friends, and you can’t always trust they are aware of your public cutoff line. So, short of giving your family and friends an all-inclusive list of “do not say,” what are your choices?  I sought out Bri Clark of Belle Consulting for some answers.

Kay:  After an author is published, how can she help friends and family understand that she must present a more professional sense of decorum? Things that are typically joked about or even ranted about in private are not appropriate for public consumption. Yet over and over I have noticed an author’s friends and family posting inappropriate things on theirsocial media. And sometimes worse, they have been known to take over a thread on social media that was designed as a way for the author to stay in touch with readers and other writers and twist it into a conversation that is often not appropriate or at the very least is not about the original topic. Without hurting feelings, is there a way to separate friends and family from the professional?

Bri:  No there’s no separation. Your family and friends were where you began on social media for most of us. I’d draft a letter sent to them personally expressing how their support has been the cornerstone of your success. With that said the image you project is scrutinized like never before. So you’ll be making it a point to police posts, tags and comments. Because you guys have been so supportive I’m confident you’ll understand. Then don’t say a word when you have to delete things.

Kay:  So, I’m wondering if it’s a common thing for family and friends to simply not realize they are crossing lines, or that things have changed now that an author is more of a public figure.

Bri:  Absolutely. They will never get that you are a potential celebrity. Or that people in society see you as something other than what your friends and family have known you as all your life. Like for me, my brother always sees me as his big sister. I’ve been at my kids’ schools and given speeches. Their friends were authorstruck, but my kids were unimpressed and wanted to know what time was dinner.

Kay: Okay, so obviously we don’t want our families treating us too differently, just want them to understand that we’re more in the public eye and  we have a persona and a level of decorum to maintain.

Bri:  However big we get, there will be three kinds of perception among those that knew you.
A. Those who are so proud and happily brag about knowing you before you were big.
B. Those who are secretly envious and will do all they can to discredit and dog you.
C. Those who are the same because to them it really doesn’t matter one way or another.

Kay: Sometimes a friend or family member will get a little too familiar and tease about something that I don’t really want out there in a public forum. They don’t seem to have the same boundaries I require for my “author mystique.” I know they really don’t mean anything – and maybe they sometimes show off because I’m getting attention and that means they do also. Sometimes they respond well when I ask that they stop and sometimes my social media gets hijacked with silliness that has little to do with my initial post. And because I have the potential to reach many people, I often will post community service things – items about adopting animals (one of my pet causes) or about military service personnel, and so on. But I also sometimes will post a question or comment directed at my readers – a general question or a snippet from a book. When these threads get hijacked by friends, even well-meaning friends, they stop serving their purpose – which is for me to connect with readers. Is there a nice way to let people know their over-the-top responses or giving away of story plots in these threads is distressing?

Bri:  Well me being sassy as I am would have to start out with a blog post or a note on my Facebook profile defining what a “reader” was. Then questions meant for readers or authors would begin with “Attention Readers…” or “Dear authors…” If a family member attempted a hijacking a warning and a link to the note would be linked.

Kay:   The other thing I sometimes see happen on my media is other authors who have a different sense of promo than I do. I often promote for fellow authors – in and out of the publishing house where I am published. But I don’t appreciate when someone posts their promo on my wall without asking. I don’t do that to other people – authors or non-authors. So do I just keep up a policing act and simply remove things or do I follow the same procedure I use with family and ask that they simply ask me before posting these things?

Bri:  I’d say once would be a warning then police it. That’s like the unspoken rule of etiquette among authors. There are exceptions. Such as if I am excited about a review and I want to share it with YOU personally and post a link with an explanation on your wall. But not blatant promo. That’s just unclassy.

Kay:  I’ve been just removing them and I get that sometimes writers don’t realize it’s poor etiquette, so I guess we should touch on the rules of author etiquette with social media promo. Any words?

Bri:  Oh, I’ll have to get heels, sunglasses and big hat first if we are going to discuss etiquette brb

First a respectable author speaks more of others blog post, books, and reviews than themselves. Second an author of caliber supports those in shoes they have already traveled. What I mean by that is we have all been down the publishing road and there are loads before us, stumbling it is our job to help where we can when we can. And third is do not spam. I’d say if you want to share something of your own 2x’s in a 24 hour period is enough. As in if you want to share a blog post share it 2x’s in 24 hours on your own wall or tweet it. And if sharing on groups or communities like that only once.

Kay:   A lot of authors are gaining attention with more than just their buy links – for instance on the blog hops with other authors or by writing their own blogs, etc. So am I correct in thinking these types of posts are the same as other promo? You wouldn’t post your blog AND your buy link within a close time frame? So what if an author has multiple blog posts, reviews, blog hops, etc. in a day? How do they decide? Obviously they shouldn’t blanket the internet with all of them all in the same places? Is there a method for choosing what to post where and when that follows the rules of decorum without socially shooting yourself in the foot?

Bri:  Personally I use services like Hootsuite and Social oomph. If I find out about a review I am excited about and a blog post on the same day that published then I would draft a status update and schedule it for the next day of one or the other. If you are somewhere else I’d say it’s acceptable to post that along with your own blog post. It’s two separate things. The point is that you aren’t posting the same thing over and over. Because then people just ignore all you post.

Kay:  So what is the bottom line in advice you can offer an author with regard to the public personal and use of social media where they not only interact with their public but with their friends and family as well?

Bri:  If you are like me and your fingers are flying over the keys or the screen of your touch pad before you hit post reread what you just typed. If you don’t hesitate to have your mother, your clergy, or your child’s teacher read it then post.

Kay:  So never post anything in the heat of the moment and remember what gets out there stays out there forever.

Bri: I did not give any sage advice like that and don’t you dare put that kind of expectation upon me!

Kay: Folks, this is the consultant you want on your side. Give us an idea where we can find you, Bri!
2012 author photo

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5 Great Lines Runaway by Meg Cabot

5 Great Lines from Runaway by Meg Cabot (YA)

1

If it turned out Brandon Stark also likes to dress up as Strawberry Shortcake while playing croquet with his miniature pony collection, I totally wouldn’t be surprised anymore.

2

Why in the name of all that is holy would anyone have ever liked Nikki in the first place? I was becoming more and more convinced she was a cross between Heidi Montag and Hitler.

3

“You’re so moody. Just because I kidnapped you and tried to force you to be my girlfriend. I thought you would be over that by now.”

4

But I don’t care what Megan Fox or Jessica Biel say: There are definite advantages to being the hottest girl on the planet. Number one was that I got paid for it. A lot.

5

“That guy back there had a gun,” Christopher went on. “Brandon Stark didn’t even have a gun, and he managed to kidnap you just by threatening to do mean things to your friends. How do you think you’re going to cope with his dad, who’s a real gangster?”


Ava Delany
The Fetish Club Series, The Homecoming Series, and The Beginnings Series.
Look for my newest release- A Surprising Day – on Kindle, Allromanceebooks, and many other places where ebooks are sold.

Too Hard, Too Soft, or Just Right?

By Kay Springsteen

Does it matter if your heroine is wearing a red shirt or a white one? Does it matter if the hero notices the color? I firmly believe in adding sensory details – what the characters experience on every level: see, hear, taste, smell, feel, and think. But it’s been argued that such details are unnecessary, boring, weigh the story down, or that the reader might prefer to fill in the blanks.

Certainly, a fine line exists between too hard, too soft, and just right. That sweet spot in the middle between too many details and too few is the “just right” of writing. But it’s not so much how many details you use as how you present them.

If I want to show the reader how my heroine is dressed, I can describe it.

She chose a red shirt with a plunging neckline and flared sleeves, then pulled on the pair of faded blue jeans with the wide bell bottom hem.

Well, we know what she’s wearing but even I yawned halfway through the sentence, and I wrote it. Now, we could have her examine herself in the mirror and think about how the red adds a bit of vibrant color to her skin and she doesn’t look so pale. We could mention pulling on her favorite red shirt and then describe the outfit from the hero’s point of view.

So what’s the most relevant part of the description to the story? What do I want to show? A flash of color maybe? Or the fact that she’s casually dressed? What the plunging neckline does for the hero? In this case, I opted to show that the shirt was loose and red because the color is what will come back later in the story (when she sees the splash of red and finds her ruined shirt in her suitcase).

The breeze whipped around the side of the house and plastered the loose red shirt to her body, outlining every delicious curve and asset for his eager eyes.

But this doesn’t show the plunging neckline or the flared sleeves. Are they important? Not especially but in order to paint a fuller picture, I can add these details in a sprinkling can fashion further along in the passage. For instance, the hero can embrace the heroine and trail kisses from her neck along the plunging neckline of her shirt to stop where it meets in between her breasts. Or the breeze can make the heroine chilly and she can rub her arms, pushing her hands beneath the flared sleeves of the shirt.

The trick is to use a watering can to sprinkle in the details rather than a fire hose to saturate the reader with sensory overload.  Happy reading and writing!

And check out the Goodreads giveaway for the Regency romance I wrote with Kim Bowman! A Lot Like a Lady giveaway.

~Kay