The Reading Challenge Group discussion

A lot of books are funny, but I find that most of the time they merely make me smile or maybe chuckle quietly to myself. Very few books have ever made me laugh out loud, regardless of what is happening around me. Anything by P.G. Wodehouse and The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy are at the top of that short list!

What about you? What books have made you laugh out loud? Has it ever turned into an embarrassing moment for you on a bus or a train or in a waiting room?

this is going to sound crazy and I read it in the cafeteria at work but The Three Musketeers. I sat in the corner of the cafeteria and giggled the whole time. People kept asking me what I was reading and looking at me like there was something wrong with me. This happened years ago, pre-ereader so I couldn't even hide what it was.

These authors and books have definitely tickled my funny bone:

Janet Evanovich's Stephanie Plum series
Laurie Notaro
Jen Lancaster
Jill Conner Browne
Dave Barry

I have never read any of the Stephanie Plum series. Everyone seems to be reading it. Was thinking of trying it.

I love humour books and have consistently laughed out loud (usually in public) at almost anything by Christopher Moore and recently with Jenny Lawson. A couple of years ago I was laughing so loudly while reading Bite Me (by Christopher Moore) on the train that I had tears running down my face!

Roseanne wrote: "I have never read any of the Stephanie Plum series. Everyone seems to be reading it. Was thinking of trying it."

I love this series! The situations are so funny as are the characters - Grandma Mazur and Lula are fantastic! Joe and Ranger are handsome and studly but also funny in their own way. Definitely worth a try - pick it up at the library - the first 5 pages had me hooked!

I'm with Cindy; Janet Evanovich's Stephanie Plum Series made me laugh out loud. I even took the books to my sister's cottage and read them aloud and my aunt, mother, and sister were all hysterically laughing with the tears running down our faces. It was basically a pee your pants session, kids and husbands had to check in on us to see what the hysteria was about; then promptly took their exit when they found out we were reading a book.

Ellen DeGeneres's books do the same thing to me -- laugh out loud; and have been caught in public places with people looking at me -- look at the nutty lady.

But don't they refresh you and no need for a therapist! Right?

The Stephanie Plum series and the pizza lovers mysteries make me laugh.

Roseanne wrote: "this is going to sound crazy and I read it in the cafeteria at work but The Three Musketeers. I sat in the corner of the cafeteria and giggled the whole time. People kept asking me what I was readi..."

Yes! I remember laughing out loud at the part where they were having a picnic in the middle of a huge battle, hahaha!

I don't remember laughing out loud at anything recently. I'm sure there have been books that did that, but I can't think of any off the top of my head.

I laughed so hard that I cried on the train at a chapter/story in Hyperbole and a Half: Unfortunate Situations, Flawed Coping Mechanisms, Mayhem, and Other Things That Happened. I drew lots of strange looks. The topic was how she sometimes feels life is ganging up on her. For example, on a morning when she really needs coffee, and the cream is empty--"How could the cream do that to me?"

I also laughed out loud at Dear American Airlines and anything by David Sedaris, especially his audiobooks.

Catch-22
The Hundred-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out of the Window and Disappeared
Life of Pi
Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe
Water for Elephants

David Sedaris Me Talk Pretty One Day
Danny Wallace Friends Like These
Sophie Kinsella - The Undomestic Goddess

These ignited not just giggles, but the whole belly laugh unattractive snorting affair that makes the reading of such books best done at home.

Recently, Bossypants and Full Frontal Feminism

only recently as it happens, and the book was written by an author from this site BUT i have known him for many years. Endangered Creatures by Stephen Dunkley and the line that made me laugh was:
"I'm sorry, but dragons don't come in pink. ”

I know there are others that are laugh out loud funny, but one of the quirkiest books that made me laugh and chuckle was Nuclear Winter Wonderland by Josh Corin. Some of the situations and dialogue were so outrageous I couldn't resist.

I have trouble with humour books, perhaps it's because I "expect to laugh", if it makes sense. I tend to laugh out loud at unexpected funny events in a "normal book", it recently happened with These Is My Words which is not considered a "funny" book, but I found some of Sarah's dialogues/situations hilarious.

American Psycho.. embarrassing on the subway.

A lot of Bill Bryson's books are funny. Probably the one that makes me really chuckle is The Lost Continent: Travels in Small Town America .

Also several of Lewis Grizzard's books are REALLY funny .

A couple of David Sedaris' stories are funny too .

Not many have made me laugh. For some reason the only one I really remember making me laugh a few times would be Dreamland by Sarah Dessen. A part where the main character is talking with her sister about toothpaste. That's all I really remember. I was cracking up then read it out loud to my sisters and they were cracking up. It probably wasn't even that funny lol we just laugh at everything.

Anything by Charles Stross, even while telling some of the most horrifying tragic tales in his Laundry Files series. His is a dry British humour, but it really works for me.

I need to take another look at Janet Evanovich. I read the first few Stephanie Plums and didn't enjoy them. But if you lot found them hysterical, I feel like I missed something. Maybe being from New Jersey gave me a different perspective. I'll hVe them another try.

I do like Jennifer Crusie. She's gotten me to lol several times. I can't think of anyone else right now for some reason. Yet I feel like I'm always making a fool of myself in public by sobbing or giggling over some book.

Wait. I thought of another one. The early Harry Potters made me laugh out loud. Still do. But now they're also tinged with nostalgia because I know the places they're all going.

I don't usually read books that make me laugh out loud (I read very serious books, how boring, I need to change that), but one was an Italian book which wasn't translated into English, Camp attack. It goes about campings and campers and it's very funny, along with the humourous illustrations.

I just read Half Magic by Edward Eager. There is an incident at the movie theater where one of the children was half there. People thought it was a ghost and the chaos that followed was laugh out loud funny.

Slinky Malinki - I was sitting on the floor in a bookshop (yeah, I have no class) reading this and crying with laughter! I had the rest of the bookshop in stitches along with me.....

Fannie Flagg makes me laugh out loud.

The Throwback reduced me to hysteria and wheezing incoherence (especially right at the end)

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

The Casual Vacancy made me laugh out loud quite a few times. It also made me cry. Both of these are some of the many reasons it's one of my all time favourite books.

Harry Potter - JK Rowling is just a brilliant writer. Period.

Flashman - wonderfully politically incorrect!

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

Fantastic Mr. Fox

A wee selection box there....

Oh gosh, so many...

All of Rick Riordan's mythology books (Percy Jackson, Heroes of Olympus, The Kane Chronicles, Magnus Chase)

Cassandra Clare's Shadowhunter Chronicles

The Magesterium series by Cassandra Clare and Holly Black

and so, so many more

It's such a rare treat to find books that really make me laugh. These were some of my favorites:

84, Charing Cross Road
Join Me!
Hit by a Farm: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Barn