Books on the Nightstand discussion

I was at the library today and got the urge to check out all the Ian Sansom "Mobile LIbrary Mysteries," so I did. I've read these a few times each and they make me laugh out loud, often to the point of tears. Another author whose books make me laugh until I cry is Polly Horvath, the Canadian children's/YA author. Other authors might make me smile, but these two are the ones who bring me to tears. Their humor is often surprising, quirky, and skillful-- nothing obvious or overplayed.

So while I sit here with my Mobile Library books and my tissues, I wonder, what other books might provoke the same response?

In general, All Creatures Great and Small is more of the "heartwarming" variety than the humorous, but I remember there being at least 4 or 5 scenes in it that had me laughing until I was crying.

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and Innocents Abroad, both by Mark Twain.

Douglas Adams

P.G. Wodehouse

David Sedaris

Jane Austen can be very funny.

Jane Austen, yes. I just finished A. Trollope's The Small House at Allington and that had me smirking much of the way through.

I haven't read David Sedaris, although I've heard him on radio shows. I should check him out.

I'm not really a LOL person when I'm reading, but I do find that Mr. Midshipman Hornblower(by C.F. Forester) has it moments. In this collection of short stories, we meet Horatio Hornblower as a very young and green, make that seasick-green, boy learning the ropes :-)

Eric wrote: "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and Innocents Abroad, both by Mark Twain.

Douglas Adams

P.G. Wodehouse

David Sedaris

Jane Austen can be very funny."

I second all of the above, and I add Terry Prachett.

Apathy and Other Small Victories is by far the funniest book I've ever read.

By John R. Powers;

The Last Catholic In America

Do Black Patent Leather Shoes Really Reflect Up?


[authorimage:Nora Ephron Nora Ephron

Bill Bryson

Douglas Adams

Erma Bombeck

Lewis Grizzard

Dave Barry

Lemony Snicket ("Kill you till you're dead")

Jon Scieszka

Gregory Maguire

Calvin Trillin

Carl Hiaasen

Nora Ephron

John Kennedy Toole's A Confederacy of Dunces always makes me laugh. I don't know whether to feel sorry for Ignatus or just punch him.

Melissa - you beat me too adding Terry Pratchett to the list. Too many LOL moments in any book to even know where to start.

Lee-you beat me to A Confederacy of Dunces. I laughed out loud on a plane reading this that DH was a little embarassed. I found it funnier the second time around, since you get a lot of the humor in the build up that just confused me on the first read.

Bridget Jones' Diary is still the funniest book I have ever read. The sequel, The Edge of Reason, is very funny, too. If you're anything of a chronic dieter or self-improver, you will laugh at Bridget and yourself!

Has anyone read any Michael Malone? I have three sitting on my TBR pile and the jacket description sounds funny, but I'd love a personal recommendation from this crowd.

Oh, yes, I remember laughing with Bridget Jones' Diary. Just for the record, I'm usually a silent reader myself, but sometimes....

I haven't read Michael Malone, Terry Pratchett, or The Confederacy of Dunces, but they get mentioned so often I should probably just dive in and try them. After I finish the Mobile Library books!

I love Michael Malone. I am looking at my collection of 9 of his books. My favorite is Handling Sin and then Dingley Falls. The Four Corners of the Sky is also very good. Actually they are all great. Three of them are a detective series and are very suspenseful with a detective and his side-kick. His books are all very funny but also deals with issues that aren't fluff. By all means, start reading Michael Malone

Darla wrote: "I love Michael Malone. I am looking at my collection of 9 of his books. My favorite is Handling Sin and then Dingley Falls. The Four Corners of the Sky is also very good. Actually they are all grea..."

Thank you. I'll put Handling Sin on my short list!

A Tiny Bit Marvellous by Dawn French made me laugh out loud several times whilst on a long train journey!
This espcially suits women who have teenage daughters!

A big second on "Bridget Jones' Diary," Douglas Adams' "Hitchhiker's Guide" (does anybody remember the radio show years ago? it was great, too) and almost anything by P. G. Wodehouse.

Nick Hornby has his moments, especially in the columns collected in "Housekeeping vs. The Dirt."

Chris wrote: "A Tiny Bit Marvellous by Dawn French made me laugh out loud several times whilst on a long train journey!
This espcially suits woment who have teenage daughters!"

Ooh me too. I listened to it in the car.

"Wanda Hickey's Night of Golden Memories and Other Disasters" and "In God We Trust, All Others Pay Cash" -- both by Jean Sheppard. Theses books are where the film "A Christmas Story" comes from. Forget which book has the story about going to the Lake County, Ind., fair but it's the only story that had me uncontrollably laugh out loud. Writes about riding a midway ride and getting sick on his dad's new J.C. Penney shirt.

"The Thurber Carnival" by James Thurber.This classic contains most of Thurber's short stories including "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty" and many of his cartoons.This is a very funny book.ger

I made the mistake of reading Jerome K. Jerome's Three Men in a Boat for the first time on a bus heading to downtown Cleveland. Given my snorts and suppressed howls and the tears of mirth streaming down my face, my fellow passengers probably thought I was out of my mind...or choking to death.

Also strongly recommended: Stella Gibbons' Cold Comfort Farm, Bailey White's Mama Makes Up Her Mind: And Other Dangers of Southern Living, H. E. Bates' The Darling Buds of May, Donald Westlake's non-series comic crime novels from the 1960s and '70s (e.g. God Save the Mark), and many of Terry Pratchett's Discworld novels (e.g. the first in the City Watch subseries, Guards! Guards!).

This is without a doubt the funniest book I have ever read.
The Mammy
by Brendan O'Carroll

Aww-my favorites were taken: Wodehouse (I don't lol easy but he ALWAYS does it for me); Lemony Snicket & Douglas Adams head my list. Also some of Evelyn Waugh, A Handful of Dust and Vile Bodiesare my 2 favorites.
And, oddly enough, The Trialby Franz Kafka had me literally rolling until I suddenly got hysterically creeped out, by which time I was far too caught to get out of the book.

Lil wrote: "Lee-you beat me to A Confederacy of Dunces. I laughed out loud on a plane reading this that DH was a little embarassed. I found it funnier the second time around, since you get a lot of the humor..."
I love Malone-almost everything by him. My favorites are Dingley Fallsand Handling Sin. I also really like Foolscap and Time's Witness. Enjoy!

The Princess Bride by William Goldman is an amazingly funny book. The movie is one of my favorites, but the book is so much better. Please read, if you haven't!

Randy wrote: "This is without a doubt the funniest book I have ever read.
The Mammy
by Brendan O'Carroll"

I read a sample after reading your post, then ended up buying the book.....very funny, great characters. If not for your post I'd probably never have found it so thanks!!

I recently read The Sex Lives of Cannibals: Adrift in the Equatorial Pacific, and found it a fun, laugh-out-loud read.

However, based on the two endorsements above for The Mammy by Brendan O'Carroll, I went in search of an excerpt to see what the fuss was about. I was snorting and hooting so loudly just from the excerpt that my husband told me to "pipe down!" Am definitely buying the book.

Paul Is Undead: The British Zombie Invasion (by Alan Goldsher; narrated by Simon Vance) is an oral history of the Beatles... if the Beatles were zombies. While I'm not into the Beatles, or zombies, or any kind of mash up, this is truly fun and funny. Simon Vance mimics all of the Beatles plus all the ancillary characters like Pete best, Mick Jagger, Brian Epstein, managers, groupies... in an irreverent absurdist comedy. Fair warning though, there's quite a bit of scatological humor and profanity - think Monty Python, uncensored! It was all I could do not to quote and tweet every line that made me laugh!

Loretta wrote: "In general, All Creatures Great and Small is more of the "heartwarming" variety than the humorous, but I remember there being at least 4 ..."

Gerald Durrell's memoir My Family and Other Animals is hysterical as are his varous books about his animal collecting trips.

I agree with several of you, especially Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain. I may be the only girl ever kicked out of class for enjoying doing her work too much. I was doing the required reading, I was, but I could not stop laughing, the best I could do was contain myself to a giggle. I was made go sit in the hall while class finished, and I continued reading my book and trying very hard not to burst out laughing.

I'm curious to read some of Terrry Pratchett's work , but the disc world series is some 30 books long!! I wouldn't know which one was the first!!

A book that made me laugh out loud in public places was Eric Weiner's The Geography of Bliss. And I learned things.

Misty wrote: "I'm curious to read some of Terrry Pratchett's work , but the disc world series is some 30 books long!! I wouldn't know which one was the first!! "

There are a couple of really great sites for checking out series order. One is fantasticfiction.com and the other is fictfact.com. Fantasticfiction.com covers all authors' works while ficfact.com only covers series. But to answer your question, the first-in-series for the Discworld books is The Color of Magic :-)

Thanks Misty & Tanya. I've had the same question for years but never remembered to ask!

What a great time of year (at least here in Michigan) to read stories that make me laugh. Thanks for all the great ideas. If you've never read Patrick F. McManus and have a guy in your life that has ever hunted or if you want to walk on the wild side in a wacky way "A Fine and Pleasant Misery" is a great place to start. Douglas Adams "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" is a book to listen to that is fun for the whole family. We used Adams book for family trips and it made the miles fly. I don’t read a lot of romance novels but Jennifer Crusie has a couple that I love "Welcome to Temptation" is so much fun with "Faking it" a must read follow up. Terry Pratchett can make me laugh, even at death. "Mort" was the first Pratchett book I read and I still love it. It’s a small book but hugely funny, well worth your time.

Small is good for me. And, of course, so is hugely funny.

Misty: As Tanya said, The Color of Magic is the first in the Discworld series, and The Light Fantastic takes up at the (literal) cliffhanger of the earlier book. Be aware that these are the two weakest books in the series. But don't give up! It's a good idea to start at the beginning so you know how the Discworld operates, but things don't really get moving until witch Granny Weatherwax is introduced in the third book, Equal Rites.

Apathy and Other Small Victories was by far the funniest book I've ever read.

Randy wrote: "This is without a doubt the funniest book I have ever read.
The Mammy
by Brendan O'Carroll"

Thanks for this Randy...I just read it and couldn't help laughing out loud! Looking forward to the next two!

Callie wrote: "The Princess Bride by William Goldman is an amazingly funny book. The movie is one of my favorites, but the book is so much better. Please read, if you haven't!"

Callie...I'm with you here! Loved the book...movie was very good too, but the BOOK was great!

I'm only in the first 1/4 of it, but surprisingly (to me) Under the Net by Iris Murdoch has me literally lol'ing. I'd forgotten this response-if I even had it the first time. It's such a long time ago, it's almost like reading it for the first time.

I love this topic as we certainly can use more laughter in our lives. It's hard to find books that are laugh out loud funny and of course, everyone's idea of humor is not the same. Like Tanya, I don't often laugh when reading but can remember laughing while reading Carl Hiaasen (pick any) and I don't know how she does it by Allison Pearson. Randy's vote for Them Mammy by Brendan O'Carroll is an all time favorite of mine.

Keep em' coming!

Hi eveyrone, Haven't commented before but couldn't resist contributing to this thread. Keep in mind I like my humor fairly low-brow.
LAMB by Christopher Moore - Funny and irreverent so recommend with caution but I chortled throughout.
Dave Barry's GUIDE TO GUYS - I listened to this and almost drove off the road as tears were pouring down my face. His guide to bad songs is hysterical, too.
I HATE MYSELF AND WANT TO DIE by Tom Reynolds is a baby boomer's music guide to the most depressing songs ever written and what sold me was his hysterical description of my pre-teen fave, Last Kiss.
PETER AND THE STARCATCHERS series by Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson. This is a children's series and best read in audio format. I've recommended this for many a road trip as Jim Dale narrates all of them and they are fun for the entire family.
And speaking of audio, if done by a good narrator, a book in audio can be even funnier than reading it in book form.
I used to find Sue Grafton's books funny, and while they are still good, Kinsey is getting a little jaded and the books don't quite have the same sense of fun but the earlier books made me LOL many times.
I have more but can't think of them right now. Will pick up The Mammy as I love to laugh while reading even though DH (and co-workers in the staff room) hate it. :)

Kinky Friedman's mysteries crack me up. Especially Elvis, Jesus & Coca-Cola, The Love Song of J. Edgar Hoover, Blast from the Past, & God Bless John Wayne. Oh and When the Cat's Away& The Prisoner of Vandam Street. And not so much but still: Curse of the Missing Puppet Head
I guess I like Friedman. And it doesn't hurt that the books take place in NYC.
Which reminds me, although they're a little on the cutesy side, & make me smile more than lol, there the Lawrence Block burglar series. Especially The Burglar Who Studied Spinoza, The Burglar in the Rye, & The Burglar Who Painted Like Mondrian. But all of them really-& he's so the opposite of funny in his Matt Scudder series, which I really adore.

I can't believe no one has mentioned Assassination Vacation by Sarah Vowell! Despite the title, it's LOL funny in places, as well as providing the reader with easily-read history.

Oh yes, Jeweleye I love Sarah Vowell and that one is excellent. I really like to listen to her books on audio because of her very unique voice, I feel the same way about books by David Sedaris both excellent narrators and funny as heck!

Woolly1 wrote: "Oh, yes, I remember laughing with Bridget Jones' Diary. Just for the record, I'm usually a silent reader myself, but sometimes....

I haven't read Michael Malone, Terry Pratchett, or The Confedera..."

Woolly1 wrote: "Oh, yes, I remember laughing with Bridget Jones' Diary. Just for the record, I'm usually a silent reader myself, but sometimes....

I haven't read Michael Malone, Terry Pratchett, or The Confedera..."

Bridget Jones was HYSTERICAL. I remember reading it on a train when I was commuting to work & laughing out loud.

I also laughed out loud while reading Bill Bryson's A Walk in the Woods.

Bill Bryson's A Walk in the Woods in on my all time favorite reading list. I have bought it and passed it on several times. We also read it for our non-fic book group and had a great time discussing it. I've seen Bill talk a few times and love listening to him.

The little debbie scene in A Walk in the Woods is priceless!

@ Esther: Thanks for the recommendation!

I have three authors that make me laugh out loud.
W. Somerset Maugham - especially his short stories "The three fat women of Antibes" and "The luncheon".
Christopher Brookmyre writes the most hilarious, action packed stories like "Be my enemy" and "A tale etched in blood and hard black pencil", and lastely the genius Jasper Fforde has written the best series about literary detective Thursday Next - who amongst other things get to travel inside books in a prose portal made by Sherlock Holmes' brother Mycroft.
The first one is called "The Eyre Affair", and this guy has the most amazing imagination. Has anyone else read his books?

I have enjoyed the Fforde books, as well. I think it would be lovely to live in a world so entwined with literature.

This may seem odd, and I hope I don't offend anyone, but I found parts of "To Kill a Mockingbird" by Harper Lee to be very funny. Of course, the main story is very serious and sad, but she mixes humor in quite often and does so very well.
I would read parts of the book out loud to my mother and we both chuckled.