Books That Make You Laugh - Fun Thread

[susiestar]

It is cold and yucky outside, the post holiday financial pinch is on, and of most anything that can go wrong, IS going wrong.

So I figured that a thread about books that make us laugh would be a GREAT thing!

What books or authors make you laugh? Which ones make you stand in the middle of the store and just laugh so loud people look at you funny or ask what you are reading?

Shelley Laurenston is a favorite author for just this reason. Her books are about shape shifters but they are goofy and hilarious. My favorite 2 titles are "Beast Behaving Badly" and "Wolf With Benefits", but any of her titles just makes me smile.

Susan Elizabeth Phillips also makes me laugh. Her characters are outrageous and so are the situations- Especially her earlier books. "It Had To Be You" is probably my favorite.

For fast and easy reading, Kerry Miller's "Passive Aggressive Notes" is a riot! My entire family finds "F: in exams" to be hilarious, I guess partly because we have so many teachers!

Of course Dave Barry is always funny, but I think the best books (even funnier on audiobook, by the way) are "Dave Barry's Book of Bad Songs" and "Dave Barry's Guide to Life".

What books make you laugh?

 

[Scent of Cedar *]

Great thread!

Anything by Anne Lamott. She writes beautifully, and is kind and snappy and very human, all at once. I just finished Bird by Bird, and have the others (Small Victory and I can't think of the other titles) on order at the library.

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22299380-small-victories

Mama Gena's School of Womanly Arts

http://www.mamagenas.com/

Reuben, Reuben by Peter DeVries

http://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/R/bo18590202.html

This is the funniest book I have ever read. It is an old book, so you may not be able to find it anymore.

My favorite authors are: James Clavell (ShoGun, Nobel House, Gai Jin, Whirlwind, King Rat), Charles Williams (Descent Into Hell, The Greater Trumps, All Hallow's Eve), Anne Rice, Maria Harris (Dance of the Spirit, the Seven Steps of Women's Spirituality).

Gone With the Wind, Margaret Mitchell.

Simple Abundance, A Daybook of Comfort and Joy, Sarah Ban Breathnack.

I am trying to unwrap Shakespeare. The language does me in, and I can't stay with it. But I love all the things he knows and can make clear for us so beautifully.

****************

For the reader's among us, Book TV is on (Channel 351) every weekend and every holiday. Non-fiction writers discuss their books, or are interviewed, and then take questions.

Brian Greene and Michio Kaku have both been interviewed on Book TV. A psychiatrist whose name I cannot remember now was interviewed regarding her book, which title I also cannot remember now, about popular understanding regarding neuro-imagery advances, and what is really true regarding brain imagery and what we are finding.

President Obama's brother was on, discussing his book. He and his brother apparently do not get along so well, but the brother is amazingly charismatic and very well spoken.

It was interesting stuff.

I am looking forward to this thread!

Cedar

 

[Wiped Out]

The entire series of Stephanie Plum books by Janet Evanovich. Every time a new book comes out I actually laugh out loud reading them.

 

[Lil]

My favorite author, Jim Butcher, writes an urban fantasy series about a wizard in Chicago...The Dresden Files. His writing, especially in this series (he has others) has the amazing ability to be both dramatic and hilarious! www.jim-butcher.com

The book I remember laughing at most fondly though, is a very old one my mother loved, called "The Egg and I" by Betty McDonald. I don't even really remember details, except that it was about a chicken farm and that I laughed until I cried. http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/23770.The_Egg_and_I

 

[Scent of Cedar *]

You know whose writing has become really fine lately is Dean Koontz. He did a book: The City, which is funny, poignant, fascinating. I quoted something from it not so long ago on a post, here.

Another of his that was very good was Brother Odd.

I love the way there is always a dog hero, a specially spiritual necessary thing and yet, never overdone.

Dean Koontz has crossed that line into excellent writing. If you haven't read him for awhile, try him again.

Cedar

 

[Lil]

Dean Koontz has crossed that line into excellent writing. If you haven't read him for awhile, try him again.

I'll have to do that! He was always kind of a poor-man's Stephen King. lol

 

[Scent of Cedar *]

He was always kind of a poor-man's Stephen King.

I agree. I don't even know why I picked up the one about the Odd Brother. I felt the same way about Dean Koontz that you do, now ~ I didn't even like the feel of him, from the way he described himself. (You know how you get a feel for a writer. Well, the way I felt about him was that he was pretty arrogant over not much.)

I have an actual antipathy toward him.

Grudgingly, I am letting that take a second seat.

I thought I was the only one who felt that way about old Dean.

Cedar

 

[Scent of Cedar *]

Stephanie Plum books by Janet Evanovich.

:O)

Ranger is so hot.

Cedar

 

[pasajes4]

I love the grandma in the Stephanie Plum series. Her antics just crack me up.

 

[BusynMember]

I love to read, but mostly read non-fiction or mysteries/action novels. I don't go for the comedy. However, one writer who can do both action and humor is Jonathan Kellerman. I'm not a huge Stephen King fan, but I loved "Misery." Not only did it fit in with my rather twisted creative mind and sense of humor, but it was actually a cool story. I laughed my way through most of it. He crossed horror with humor.

I have tried several Dean Koontz books. I don't know anything personal about the author, but I can't get into his books.

 

[Scent of Cedar *]

www.jim-butcher.com

I ordered Skin Game and Small Favor.

***

MWM, my favorite Stephan King was The Stand. I read that he was using so much cocaine during the writing of Tommyknockers that there would be blood from his nose all over the pages as he wrote.

I read Misery, and I have even seen the movie, but I never did like that one. Too scary!

Cedar

 

[Scent of Cedar *]

Garrison Keeler?

A Prairie Home Companion?

All about life in that town where the women are strong and all the children above average?

Well, that is a radio program, but it is a good, fine thing, and so funny! On PBS radio stations.

Cedar

 

[BusynMember]

MWM, my favorite Stephan King was The Stand. I read that he was using so much cocaine during the writing of Tommyknockers that there would be blood from his nose all over the pages as he wrote.
I read Misery, and I have even seen the movie, but I never did like that one. Too scary!

Oh, he had a loooooooooong stint with cocaine and wrote some of his best stuff while a drug addict! He also wrote Misery while high. I read his autobiography

 

[Lil]

I ordered Skin Game and Small Favor.

Um...you've read the other's right? Because if you don't read them in order, you'll be completely lost.

 

[Scent of Cedar *]

I may have read one of his books this Fall, Lil.

There was a powerful wizard, the times were modern, and the wizard was challenged in such a way that I was sure he wasn't going to make it. I enjoyed the book, but never saw it again. When you posted about buying the newest book in a series by the writer Jim Butcher for your son awhile back, I began keeping an eye out for that name at our library here, but never spotted that writer, or even that same book, again.

I did an online search for Jim Butcher today after your posting. Sure enough, the Jim Butcher storylines on the library site are about a wizard living in a city in modern times.

I am thinking it's the same writer.

I am so excited.

:O)

Cedar

 

[Lil]

Well even if you haven't read the series, you will find them enjoyable...but he introduces new characters all the time and kind of expects you to know who they are...so likely you'll say, "Wait! How did he have a brother who's a vampire?" "Who is this girl and why is she queen of the fairies when he knows her father who isn't?" LOL

I can't imagine a public library not having them in the sci-fi section...ours has the entire series...and his other series too!

His wife writes romance and paranormal romance and they should have hers too, Shannon Butcher.

 

[compassion]

Garrison Keeler?

A Prairie Home Companion?

All about life in that town where the women are strong and all the children above average?

Well, that is a radio program, but it is a good, fine thing, and so funny! On PBS radio stations.

Cedar

I was laughing so hard yesterday listening to Garrison Keeler live from San Francisco. The parody about liberal arts majors was brilliant!

 

[Scent of Cedar *]

Well, huh. I never looked in the science fiction section, Lil.

***

http://www.amazon.com/Afford-Luxury-Negative-Thought-Series/dp/0931580242

This is a book I awakened thinking about. I read it years and years ago and here it still is. It is a great, funny book, filled with ways to change our thought patterns.

"We lived for days on nothing but food and water."

WC FIELDS

***

"It's not that I'm afraid to die ~ it's that it is impossible to contemplate one's own death and still carry a tune."

Woody Allen

Those are both from that book. They went into my quote box.

Cedar

P.S. I didn't look them up before I posted, so I might be off by a word.

 

[nlj]

Winnie The Pooh

So great to revisit a children's classic now and again. A reminder of our times past when the weight of parenthood was a distant speck in our future lives.

 

[Scent of Cedar *]

It's the strangest thing, but I cannot read children's books without crying.

Well, that isn't true. I was able to read to my grands.

It is deeply upsetting, though.

Back when I decided I had lost everything, there was a Dr. Seuss saying I kept on the fridge. (People only have to read my fridge to know every secret we have!)

Your brain's in your head
Your feets in your shoes
Your hands in your pockets
You've got nothing to lose....

I think I added those last two lines.

So, I had nothing that mattered, and I didn't care about what I did have. So, I took ballet classes for years and years. Took a degree.

Recreated my life.

Kept husband.

:O)

Cedar