# Audit: Comedy Doctor — Chapter 24: First Snow

id: comedy_doctor | chapter: 24 | owner: claude | tier: risk

Read against the binding `checks/audits/comedy_doctor.md`. Register commitment (READING GUIDE §2): "Warm, precise, lightly comic. Quiet interiority over quippiness … observational and character-true — June's dryness, Theo's over-competent flailing, Odile's brutal economy — never sitcom rhythm, never banter for banter's sake." Comp calibration: Beth O'Leary / Emily Henry at ~60% banter / *Morisaki Bookshop* / *Before the Coffee Gets Cold*. **Target reader:** someone who reads warm, character-first contemporary romance/found-family and wants low, dry, non-portable wit — not a workshop-quotable zinger. Every score below is against that reader, not a generic literary judge.

Repair-state checks confirmed against current text before scoring: `which` captions — **absent** (grep clean); `whole ___` template — **absent** (l. 91 "the whole week" is literal duration, not a caption); `load-bearing` — **absent** (banned outright); dialogue-diagnosis / sentence-quality jokes — **none surviving** (independently confirmed; the Dialogue Doctor round-2 CLEAN holds — no joke in this chapter is built on rating a character's phrasing). Deflecting-tag narration family (frozen at 4 in Ch22, tics.md l. 371) — **not refilled**; June's deflections here live in dialogue/interiority, not in narration-tags that rate a deflection.

---

## INVENTORY

1 — "She left it a tower and counted that, privately, as growth." (l. 3) — mechanism: anticlimax / self-deflation (ironic "growth" for declining to fan the cups) — source: character (June's compose-the-room compulsion, this book's arranging tell) — funniness: 2 — portable: no — dramatic work: sets June's "don't perform a room I'm standing inside of" arc in one beat — workshopped: no

2 — "the radiator sounded like it was trying to leave the building" (l. 7) — mechanism: personification / incongruity — source: character (Sam) + situation — funniness: 2 — portable: no (in deployment it triggers June's dread-release; the image alone is the chapter's most transferable — see counter-candidate note) — dramatic work: dissolves June's showcase-dread, cards Sam's warmth — workshopped: no

3 — "the dread turned out to be the kind you only get to have in advance" (l. 7) — mechanism: deflation / reversal (aphoristic) — source: character (June's leave-before-wanting wound) — funniness: 2 — portable: no (her thesis-wound rendered wry) — dramatic work: names her central arc sideways instead of stating it — workshopped: no

4 — "It was a good flyer." (l. 9) — mechanism: deadpan understatement (flat button after the empty-room/full-room image) — source: character (June's dry generosity) — funniness: 2 — portable: no (Ben's over-agonized object) — dramatic work: warmth toward Ben; June choosing the full room over the composed one — workshopped: no

5 — "Sam's big loose canvas that was either a dog or a sofa and refused to commit" (l. 11) — mechanism: personification / incongruity — source: character (Sam's loose style, June's read) — funniness: 2 — portable: no (Sam's specific canvas) — dramatic work: fixes the cohort's range in one stroke — workshopped: no

6 — "Luis's three small studies hung so precisely you could have leveled a shelf against them" (l. 11) — mechanism: hyperbole tied to trade — source: character (Luis the installer) — funniness: 2 — portable: no (Luis) — dramatic work: cards Luis's precision; primes his placement authority — workshopped: no

7 — "It's meant to lean," … "Now he went to top off a water jar that didn't need it." (ll. 27–29) — mechanism: character-collision (Sam's installer fix-reflex "I've got a level in the car. Two minutes." vs. Theo's restraint) + displacement-action — source: character/situation — funniness: 2 — portable: no (the lean/pentimento, the water-jar motif) — dramatic work: Theo's arc — declines the sermon, displaces into a needless task — workshopped: no

8 — "I washed it," … "Twice. Once for no reason. Here." (l. 37) — mechanism: self-deprecating deadpan — source: character (June) — funniness: 2 — portable: no (the blue-dish return) — dramatic work: June's nerves at the dish-return; warmth with Mara — workshopped: no

9 — "because a dish that comes back full is a dish that gets to come back" (l. 39) — mechanism: proverb / care-maxim (X-that-Ys is X-that-Zs symmetry, appended to an action by "because") — source: character (Mara) rendered as portable maxim — funniness: 1 — portable: **yes** — dramatic work: motivates the blue-dish tether (cohort/June continuity) — workshopped: **yes** — **BLOCKING**

10 — "There," Luis said. … Mara "closed her mouth and let the dish sit there saying exactly what Luis wanted it to say and nothing extra." (ll. 41–43) — mechanism: terse authority (Luis) + arc-payoff / tic-subversion (Mara stops narrating Luis) — source: character — funniness: 2 — portable: no (the Mara/Luis owned arc) — dramatic work: pays off Mara's owned care-arc — workshopped: no

11 — "You want that," she said. June took it. It had too much milk." (l. 45) — mechanism: character-care incongruity (unasked coffee, wrong milk) — source: character (Priya) — funniness: 2 — portable: no (Priya's "still learning to ask" arc) — dramatic work: Priya's care rendered as her managing-love wound — workshopped: no

12 — "left it a half-degree off level on purpose, and walked away. For Ben, practically skywriting." (l. 47) — mechanism: hyperbole / incongruity — source: character (Ben's anxious over-control) — funniness: 2 — portable: no (Ben) — dramatic work: Ben's loosening arc; April subtext — workshopped: no

13 — "I had the paragraph loaded." … "carrying paragraphs around in my pocket all night … I don't know how you've done it your entire life." (l. 73) — mechanism: comic self-image / incongruity (speeches as pocket-litter) — source: character (Theo's over-explainer arc, now self-aware) — funniness: 2 — portable: no (his pentimento-sermon habit) — dramatic work: names his restraint-arc; couple intimacy — workshopped: no

14 — "Practice," … "And I say mine to myself later. Worse for you, better for the party." (l. 75) — mechanism: deflection-by-joke — source: character (June) — funniness: 2 — portable: no — dramatic work: deflects Theo's vulnerability warmly while confessing her own wound (says it to herself later) — workshopped: no

15 — "Bring it whenever," … "That's why dishes exist." (l. 79) — mechanism: self-correction ("Bring it Tuesday" → no more Tuesdays) + deadpan warmth — source: character (Mara) — funniness: 2 — portable: no (anchored to the last-Tuesday grief and the specific dish) — dramatic work: the cohort's ending carried without a scene — workshopped: no (see sweetness note: dish-maxim family with item 9)

16 — "neither of them looking eleven minutes apart tonight" (l. 81) — mechanism: running-gag callback (payoff with variation) — source: character (Priya/Ben timing gag, set up through Ch23 l. 105) — funniness: 2 (invested reader) — portable: no (their specific gag) — dramatic work: pays off Priya/Ben ("April a real place they intended to walk into on their own feet") — workshopped: no

17 — "He'd held the door for the collectors by keeping it shut." (l. 83) — mechanism: paradox / antithesis (idiom inversion: "held the door" → "by keeping it shut") — source: narrator-overlay — funniness: 1 — portable: **yes** — dramatic work: marks Theo's boundary/restraint arc (he protects the room's time instead of over-serving) — workshopped: **yes** — **BLOCKING**

18 — "Sign yourself out too," … "You're work that left the building. I keep a record." (l. 113) — mechanism: deadpan reframe / economy — source: character (Odile) — funniness: 2 — portable: no (the CHECK-OUT ledger; June-as-inventory) — dramatic work: opens the reveal; is her whole method (people as work she conducts) — workshopped: no — **STRONGEST surviving item**

19 — "He was handy. He's my--" … "He was handy," she said again. (l. 121) — mechanism: economy + self-interruption (deflecting the nephew word) — source: character (Odile) — funniness: 2 — portable: no (the guarded secret) — dramatic work: guards the nephew secret while confessing the scheme — workshopped: no

20 — "I ran a class," … "I'm retiring, not dead." (l. 125) — mechanism: deadpan reframe / economy — source: character (Odile) — funniness: 2 — portable: no (characterizes her appetite at the reveal, in her sanctioned register) — dramatic work: lands the reveal as appetite, not sentiment; refuses the apology — workshopped: no (watch: quotable-Odile ceiling per voice card — this is the one high-density line, no fourth aphorism follows)

21 — "Then she went up to be retired at some collectors" (l. 137) — mechanism: syntactic incongruity ("retired at" people, as a thing done to her) — source: narrator-overlay (June's read) — funniness: 2 — portable: no (the Hallorans; folded mid-sentence, not freestanding) — dramatic work: colors Odile's disdain for collectors ("none of my time") — workshopped: no (the second, milder narrator-overlay note — see distribution)

22 — "Keep it. Paint another one where I'm facing the right way and I'll think about it." (l. 143) — mechanism: deflection-by-conditional — source: character (June) — funniness: 2 — portable: no (the portrait) — dramatic work: accepts the portrait's meaning sideways; hands Theo his first own thing — workshopped: no

23 — "she liked him so much in that second it was faintly annoying." (l. 145) — mechanism: affection-as-annoyance deflation — source: character (June) — funniness: 2 — portable: no (rescued by the specific setup — "he … drank the idea instead … she watched it cost him and watched him pay it") — dramatic work: June's core contradiction (wants to be seen / hates being caught wanting) — workshopped: no — **WEAKEST non-blocking item** (most familiar romance button; named as watch)

24 — "she still took her water home … she was in training." (l. 155) — mechanism: incongruity / deadpan (rinse-water carry as athletic training) — source: character (June) — funniness: 2 — portable: no (Ridgewood; the water-home motif) — dramatic work: her chosen hard life, self-first — workshopped: no

25 — "a February problem, a Kessler-in-March problem, an eight-hundred-dollars-by-Thursday problem" (l. 155) — mechanism: escalation / list curdling into stakes — source: character (June's money reality) — funniness: 2 — portable: no (Kessler; the $800-by-Thursday) — dramatic work: routes comedy *into* the closing ache rather than softening it — workshopped: no

26 — "I come back and hand two rich people some drawings. That's it. I'm not carrying anything." (l. 157) — mechanism: self-deflation (the Rauch/Diebenkorn reduced to "some drawings") + self-correction ("walk you to the--" / "To the corner") — source: character (Theo's arc) — funniness: 2 — portable: no (the Hallorans/collectors) — dramatic work: the door-off-its-hinge reflex caught and refused; releases June to her own train — workshopped: no

27 — "You're not carrying anything," June agreed (l. 159) — mechanism: deadpan echo (repetition-with-variation) — source: character (June) — funniness: 2 — portable: no (echoes Theo's self-instruction) — dramatic work: her independence, made literal (own water, own work, own train) — workshopped: no

**Running gags checked against motif state:** (a) *the water jar that didn't need filling* — ll. 27–29, 61, 65 (~2–3 instances, varied: sermon-displacement → hovering evidence); character-sourced, within reason, not a treadmill. (b) *dish logistics / the cobalt tether* (the task's named watch) — ll. 37, 39, 79: three warm beats each doing distinct work; **does not become a zinger treadmill**, but item 9 is the one portable/maxim instance (flagged). (c) *"eleven minutes apart"* — l. 81 callback payoff. None exceeds a sane count.

---

## DISTRIBUTION CHECKS (work shown)

**Source (the narrator-overlay hunt).** 25 of 27 items are character- or situation-sourced. Only two are narrator-overlay: l. 83 (blocking) and l. 137 (accepted — folded mid-sentence, non-freestanding, in June's established painter-dry read). This is the *opposite* of the LLM default; the chapter is funny *inside* the book, not witty *at* it. Genuine strength — shown, not asserted.

**Mechanism variety (MONOTONOUS test).** Deadpan/deflation is the plurality (~9: items 1, 3, 4, 8, 14, 22, 24, 27, plus 23) — but that is the register's mandated engine ("June's dryness"), not a defect, and it is not a monopoly: personification (2, 5), hyperbole (6, 12, 25), Odile-economy (18, 19, 20), Theo self-image (13, 26), Luis terseness (10), Mara warmth (15), running-gag callback (16), paradox (17). Varied. **Not MONOTONOUS.**

**Sweetness calibration (OVERSWEETENED test).** The beats the book wants sharp are left sharp and un-joked: the *catch* (Ruth's "You didn't start this together" / June's "No … We didn't." — no comic cushion); Odile's un-apologized manipulation ("It wasn't yours to run." / "No … It wasn't." — the text refuses the apology, "no apology after it"); the portrait ache (ll. 99–105, entirely joke-free); and the money precarity, where comedy is routed *into* the ache (items 24–25), not over it. **Not OVERSWEETENED.** One watch: the dish-maxim family (items 9 + 15) is the chapter's only sweet-proverb pressure; item 9 is flagged. A second appended generalization — l. 45, "that was what it was to be handed something by a person still learning to ask" — is milder and embedded, not freestanding; it stays under the bar but confirms the family is live. If l. 39 is repaired, verify l. 79 / l. 45 don't then carry the maxim load alone.

**Cringe test.** None. No sitcom rhythm, no groaner, no try-hard zinger. The register holds warm-low throughout.

**Density (DRY / THIN test).** Every scene carries at least one committed warm beat; density sits at the upper-comfortable edge of "lightly comic" without tipping into a quip-treadmill. **Not DRY, not THIN.**

**Named-concern confirmations.**
- *Snow ending not undercut* — CONFIRMED. Weather stays literal ("It won't stick … Ground's too warm. It'll be wet by morning." / "I know."); the final image (l. 161) closes on the material ache ("eight hundred dollars due Thursday, and she went"), un-joked. No metaphor-as-feeling restored.
- *Odile reveal not undercut* — CONFIRMED. Her wit (items 18–20) is the *vehicle* of the reveal, not a deflection of it; the gravity lands in the plain exchange, and "I'm retiring, not dead" characterizes appetite rather than puncturing the beat. No oracle monologue.
- *Cohort warmth not a forgiveness speech / found-family slogan* — CONFIRMED in dialogue: no group absolution speech, no "found family" naming. Theo's "the room can hold it … Nobody needs the rest" (l. 69) is the nearest thesis-phrase but stays private (June/Theo), grounded, and non-comic — out of comedy scope, noted as a watch only. The **one** near-slogan is the l. 39 dish-maxim (flagged below).

**Strongest surviving item:** item 18 — Odile's "You're work that left the building. I keep a record." (best line, fewest words, wholly her method). **Weakest surviving item:** item 17 — "He'd held the door for the collectors by keeping it shut." (workshopped narrator-overlay; blocking).

---

## CHAPTER VERDICT

**CLEAR** — comedy lands in register: majority funniness-2, overwhelmingly character/situation-sourced, non-portable, mechanisms varied, sweetness calibrated, no cringe.

**Two blocking findings stand (items 9 and 17).** Per the binding blocking rule, a portable-yes and/or workshopped-yes item is blocking regardless of the distribution verdict: **the chapter is CLEAR in distribution but not committable until both are resolved.**

---

## REVISION ORDERS

**RO-1 — item 17, l. 83: "He'd held the door for the collectors by keeping it shut."** Failure: workshopped narrator-overlay — an antithetical idiom-inversion ("held the door … by keeping it shut") with punchline syntax, composed-for-quotation, wit that no character generates (Theo isn't being witty; the narrator paints the paradox over his action). It is the one place the chapter is clever *at* itself. It does real arc work (Theo's boundary), so **de-workshop, do not cut.** The surrounding action already carries it — he sends the Hallorans to the Orchard bar for twenty minutes and comes back up alone. Drop the paradox button and let the result state the fact, in the plain, errand-done register of Theo's voice card ("logistical tenderness … absorbs logistics so others can be present"). Direction (not final prose): "He came back up alone. The room stayed theirs for twenty more minutes." — the boundary as a handled errand, not a narrator epigram. Softening it into a gentler paradox is not compliance; remove the antithesis.

**RO-2 — item 9, l. 39: "because a dish that comes back full is a dish that gets to come back."** Failure: portable + workshopped — a symmetric care-proverb appended to an action by "because," the exact transferable-wit pattern the rest of the chapter avoids; it would drop unchanged into any warm found-family novel, and it is the chapter's single found-family-slogan risk (a named watch). It does plot work (the cobalt tether — the dish, and June, get a reason to return), so **de-portable-ize, keep the warmth and the plot.** Replace the general maxim with the specific act plus, at most, a dish-specific plain line in Mara's voice (voice card: "narrates the room kindly, fills gaps," care move = social memory/inclusion; guardrail: "avoid making every line a social punchline"). Anchor to *this* object — the blue dish June just returned (blue-dish tether planted Ch18), the empanadas — not to dishes-in-general. Direction (not final prose): let the act carry it — "She spooned half the empanadas into the cobalt, so it would have to come back" — or give Mara a plain line tied to bringing *this* dish back full. After the fix, confirm the maxim load has not migrated to l. 79 ("That's why dishes exist") or l. 45.
