Do Black Comedy sell well in the humor market?

M.N Thorne

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Hello everyone,

I was wondering if black comedy sell well in the humor market? I was thinking about writing a black comedy novel and I was just wondering about the humor market.
 

Caffrey

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I think black humour can exist in any genre of fiction, but is rarely flagged as comedy. For me, I find that if a writer labels their own work as black humour, it rarely is!

How humorous black humour should be comes down to the individual, as does how dark it is!
 

Kalsik

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Black comedy can work, but in my experience it works best when its either subtle, or is delivered with enough consistency that it doesn't cause the 'bathos effect'. If you're trying to have a dramatic moment, black comedy can ruin it if it hasn't already been used, as you've not warned the reader that you're prepared to go this route.
For a character's perspective, black comedy works better the less invested they are in whoever's suffering for it. And yes, that can even include themself or a close one, if they have similar tastes in humor or irony.
 

Sagml John

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Making light of the macabre is pretty popular but I'm not sure if it can be categorized as comedy or what. It seems like the only things that can use comedy as a genre are joke books. Beetle Juice is a comedy movie but, if it were a book, what would it be? Marketing stuff like that is the worst challenge!
 

Alan Aspie

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Hello everyone,

I was wondering if black comedy sell well in the humor market?

It does, extremely well, but only when it is funny. And that is rare.

Tom Sharpe
Carl Hiaasen
Josep Heller
Mihail Bulgakov
Charles Bukovsky
Neil Gaiman
Terry Pratchett
Scott Adams
C. Northcote Parkinson
Kari Hotakainen
William Shakespeare...
 
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