Lessons from Lucy Score
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Humor is a big part of Lucy Score’s writing. Even when someone is being murdered, she can usually find a way to make readers laugh. Lucy writes contemporary romance, often with suspense or mystery woven into the plot. She has also built her Riley Thorne series around a much zanier mix of romance, mystery, paranormal elements, and comedy.
And she has been writing funny things for a very long time.
Finding your funny
Lucy’s first experience with published writing happened when she was 16. Her local newspaper had a program for teenagers, and she signed up. At the time, she wanted to be the next Lois Lane. She was also a huge fan of Dave Barry and Erma Bombeck.
The program gave her opportunities to write different kinds of pieces. Humor columns quickly became her favorite.
She loved having an excuse to be goofy. That instinct stayed with her, even when she moved on to college and eventually started writing novels.
For Lucy, humor feels natural because it has always been part of how she writes. That doesn’t mean every writer needs to be naturally funny, though.
She believes humor can be studied and practiced. Reading writers who make you laugh is one place to start.
Let your characters do the work
When Lucy wants to make a scene funny, she often starts with the characters themselves.
Banter is one of her favorite tools. She especially enjoys writing siblings because she knows how ridiculous sibling conversations can become.
Her own brother and sister helped inspire that dynamic. According to Lucy, the three of them can become pretty intense when they get together.
That same energy works beautifully between fictional characters. Siblings can insult each other without actually hurting their relationship.
Enemies can work just as well. Put two people together who cannot stand each other, and give them plenty of opportunities to argue.
The trick is making those arguments feel specific to the characters. Their humor should sound like something only those two people would say.
Get creative with insults
Lucy has a lot of fun with insults. Not the generic kind, either.
She likes coming up with insults that fit the person, the relationship, and the situation.
She gave an example from The Dead Guy Next Door, where her hero has what she calls an “anti-bromance” with two other men.
They constantly bicker. One character is particularly tall and muscular, which gives Lucy plenty of material to work with.
The insults become part of their relationship. They are funny because we understand who these men are and why they annoy each other.
Lucy also has a practical solution when the perfect comeback refuses to appear. She leaves herself a note and keeps writing.
Future Lucy can figure out the insult later.
Don’t forget the supporting cast
Secondary characters are another major source of humor in Lucy’s books.
They do not simply exist to move the plot from one scene to another. Lucy creates full characters for them, complete with personalities, histories, voices, and quirks.
That gives her plenty of opportunities to create unexpected moments.
The Riley Thorne series is a great example. Riley lives with several elderly roommates in a crumbling mansion, and they regularly create their own version of chaos.
Riley herself is not necessarily the funniest person in the room. Sometimes she is the straight character surrounded by people behaving completely absurdly.
That contrast can make a scene even funnier.
Humor can make suspense easier to take
Lucy also talked about something that can be tricky for writers: using humor when the story deals with serious subjects.
Her Riley Thorne books let her go all the way into madcap territory. Her contemporary romances with romantic suspense elements require more restraint.
The danger still needs to feel real. Readers need to care about what happens.
At the same time, Lucy likes giving readers a little relief from the tension. She described humor as a kind of coping mechanism.
That makes sense when you look at The Dead Guy Next Door. There are murders throughout the story, but the tone keeps them from becoming relentlessly dark.
As Lucy put it during our conversation, sometimes nobody is particularly sad to see the victim go.
That balance is one reason humor can work so well in romantic suspense. You can raise the stakes without keeping the reader emotionally clenched through every scene.
Look for the funny situation
Not every funny moment has to come from a clever line.
Sometimes the situation is funny all by itself.
Lucy talked about using the setting, the other characters, and whatever is happening in the scene to push the comedy further.
In the Riley Thorne books, that might mean Riley is dealing with a murder while also living with a house full of elderly troublemakers.
The characters can make an already strange situation even stranger.
This is especially useful when you feel like you are forcing jokes into a scene. Instead of adding another punchline, look around the scene.
Who else is there? What are they doing? What could go wrong?
Sometimes the answer is sitting right in front of you.
Dialogue does most of the heavy lifting
If you took all the dialogue out of Lucy’s books, she says there would still be funny situations.
But most of the humor would disappear.
For Lucy, the best comedy usually comes from characters interacting with each other. Their personalities clash, their relationships show through, and their conversations take unexpected turns.
Inner dialogue matters, too. Sometimes what a character thinks is much funnier than what they actually say.
That can be especially effective in romance. A character can look perfectly composed while their internal monologue is completely unhinged.
Give every character a life
One reason Lucy can keep her books so long is that she is interested in more than the central romance.
She wants to know what every character wants. She wants to know what stands in their way and what they actually need.
That includes characters who might only appear briefly.
Lucy keeps an Excel character bible for every book. Everyone mentioned in the story goes into it.
She tracks details such as how characters sound, their jobs, their ages, their pets, and other small details.
For a series, that document keeps growing.
It may sound like a lot of work, but it solves a very real problem. When Lucy returns to a minor character fifty chapters later, she can find the details instead of digging through the manuscript.
Know when a scene isn’t working
Lucy had another piece of advice that applies well beyond comedy.
If she is bored while writing a scene, she assumes something is wrong.
She asks what the scene is actually doing. If it is not working, she might rewrite it, change it, or skip ahead.
That can be particularly helpful when you are trying to make a scene funny.
You do not need to force humor into a scene that has no energy. Sometimes the better solution is figuring out why the scene feels flat.
Maybe the characters need more conflict. Maybe the setting needs to change. Maybe a secondary character needs to get involved.
Or maybe the scene simply does not need to be there.
Outline, then let the story surprise you
Lucy describes herself as both a plotter and a pantser.
She starts with a detailed outline. Then she begins writing and discovers that the story has other plans.
That can lead to some very long books. She might outline a 100,000-word story and end up with 160,000 words.
She recently described realizing deep into a manuscript that a major part of her heroine’s character arc was not going to work.
That sounds like a nightmare. For Lucy, though, it is part of the process.
Writing reveals things that an outline cannot always reveal. Sometimes you have to get into the story before you understand what the story is actually about.
Humor takes practice
Lucy does think some people are naturally funny. She also thinks writers can get better at humor.
Her advice is to study the people and writers who make you laugh.
Read their work closely. Do not just notice that something is funny. Ask yourself why.
Was it the wording? The timing? The character’s reaction? The situation?
Was someone being completely serious while everything around them was falling apart?
That kind of attention can help you develop your own instincts. You can start noticing the mechanics behind humor instead of treating it like something mysterious.
Find the right voice for audio
Humor can also change dramatically when a book becomes an audiobook.
The same line can sound affectionate, sarcastic, irritated, or downright cruel depending on how it is delivered.
Lucy learned early that she wanted voice actors rather than narrators who simply read the words.
She prefers working with narrators who understand her characters and her sense of humor. That familiarity lets her trust them to perform the dialogue.
It is an important consideration for authors thinking about audiobook production. A funny line only works if the listener hears the humor in it.
Stop trying to make everything perfect
By the end of writing a book, Lucy is usually sick of it.
She sees that as a good sign.
If she kept trying to perfect every sentence forever, she might never finish. Instead, she works until she is happy with the story and then lets it go.
Distance helps, too. Once the editing process comes around, she can start enjoying the book again.
That is probably familiar to anyone who has spent months living inside the same manuscript.
At some point, you have to decide that the story is ready.
About Lucy
Lucy Score is a #1 New York Times bestselling author known for contemporary romance, romantic comedy, and romantic suspense. She has sold millions of books worldwide, with her work translated into 29 languages. Her books include the Knockemout and Riley Thorn series, as well as numerous standalone romances. Lucy lives in Pennsylvania with her husband and their cat, Cleo.
This blog post was developed from a previous First Draft Friday conversation between Alessandra Torre and Lucy Score. Want to hear Lucy and Alessandra discuss these techniques in their own words? Watch the full 30-minute First Draft Friday conversation, including questions from the live audience. Episode #75
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