by Jessica HolmesMcClelland & Stewart
~ Review in Halifax Herald, October 2010
Jessica Holmes has a ‘Laughter’ button on her website. Who could ignore that? After all, everyone needs a good laugh. But a click brought a surprise. Holmes did some research a while ago on the “importance of laughter, and its benefits on our health, mood, longevity, etc.” Apparently we don’t laugh enough. Who knew!!! We don’t even talk together enough and Holmes thinks we can do better, that “we could all benefit from a big group belly laugh.” It’s hard to disagree with that, and following that trajectory, Holmes’s new book, I Love Your Laugh, must surely be beneficial to our health.
Holmes’s memoir recounts her life so far. She was raised in a less than traditional household and the vastly differing beliefs of her parents - fundamentalist vs. feminist - meant there was some confusion to be sorted. Holmes regales her readers with stories and anecdotes that do more than entertain. They cause lots of smiles and laughter.
Holmes was the family comic from the beginning, translating events into the comedic, working hard for the funny side of things. But even a comedienne has downtime and Holmes is not afraid to write about the not so funny parts of her life experiences. Being relentlessly funny is not easy apparently, and occasionally Holmes had to work hard to extract humor from situations. “I couldn’t remember the last time I’d really laughed. My optimism had disappeared somewhere along the way, and I was living protectively, hanging on to anything I could, afraid of what life would take from me next.”
But she does keep laughing and making fun of what life throws at her because this is how she views the world and according to her Laughter theory, we’re all healthier for it!
Jessica Holmes is a member of Air Farce Live (aka The Royal Canadian Air Farce) and star of The Holmes Show. She is also a screenwriter and a mom. This is her first book.
