Is there a market for humorous Westerns?

Recently, I bought a book in one of those unending series written by a deceased author (whose initials are William W. Johnstone). (In my defense, I was curious and needed some Western fluff, and because it had decent type .) This one seemed to stand apart from the rest because it included a humorous subplot about a cowardly Easterner. The book drew a harsh review from a reader who thought this sort of plot was better left to people who liked movies like Paleface. But I thought it looked like it could be fun. (And I wish I knew enough to know who the ghostwriter was because if I like it, I won't be able to write a fan letter. )

So I wondered... Is there room for humorous Westerns? Are there a lot of outright humorous Westerns, like Cat Ballou (Hey, I forgot that was a book first. ) or for that matter, Blazing Saddles? Or is humor better left as a side dish in Westerns today? (For example, witty dialogue or banter in the middle of a serious plot?) Then again, while most of the Westerns I've bought lately have been really really really serious , wasn't humor an important part of the culture of the Old West (folklore, tall tales, etc.)? After all, humor can be a great way of coping with a harsh, dangerous life.

P.S. It's all the fault of TV. The first Western I really liked was a funny TV movie called Evil Roy Slade.

JeanneTGC said:

I sure hope so, Cool Thread Starter Girl, because I have a parody/satire just begging me to get to it soon.

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Cool. Maybe you can create that market for me. Because if I were to write a Western, it would probably end up being a totally batty book. Even if I tried to write something serious, I'd end up with outhouse jokes and runaway pigs.

JeanneTGC said:

I think there's a place for ANYthing if it's written/executed well enough. But that's me, Ms. Optimism 2008.

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Yeah, the well enough part is the killer, ain't it?

PortableHal said:

The people that say that there's a market for everything? Don't listen to 'em.

If the publisher doesn't think there's an existing market for a humorous Western, he won't be buying your's.

Sad but true.

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But even in today's very tight Western market, I've seen some recent Westerns with a humorous tone. In two of the cases, they were action-oriented first , but they definitely had a humorous tone as well. Sometimes gallows (heh) humor. I'm sure there were others out there like that, where the humor forms part of the whole.

Also, writers are often told to chase trends -- but it's easy to forget that what we see on the shelves today doesn't reflect what publishers want now. If you don't see a particular type of book, that doesn't mean publishers don't want them now. What they don't want is the same ol' thing, unless you make it interesting again.

Edited to Add:
OTOH sometimes I think it can be harder for established authors. We've all heard of established authors who wanted to write the book of their heart but didn't dare write "on spec" or who couldn't get something published because it wasn't their usual type of book. Even best-selling authors have a hard time bucking trends. I recently read that NYT best-selling author Jayne Ann Krentz said that her career was nearly derailed when she published futuristic romances under her own name. I thought the books were cool, but a lot of fans were disappointed and couldn't "get" the subgenre. (Later, when she broke out of her usual style, she used pen names to keep the different types of books separate.) Now, futuristic and paranormal romances are much more common, and there are many big name authors branching out, sometimes under their own names. But someone had to buck the trends first, and someone had to help make those types of books acceptable.