Looking for something light and humorous. What’s the funniest book you’ve read?
What is the funniest book you’ve ever read?
Suggestion ThreadI just finished this and it’s what prompted this whole post! Loved it
The story about Richard in Solutions and Other Problems is one of the funniest things I’ve ever read.
Then follow u\girlinthegoldenboots (I hope I did that right) advice and read Solutions and other Problems
Tears were streaming down my face as I read this.
Yes! also Solutions and Other Problems
Fantastic! I'll be adding this to my Kindle in the AM.
I still laugh every time someone says “Kenny Loggins”
Three Men in a Boat
Have you read To Say Nothing of the Dog by Connie Willis? It’s kind of a tribute to Three Men in a Boat and is really funny. (Also the first in a series that gets better with every book!)
To Say Nothing of the Dog is amazing!
That is the subtitle of the original book! Will need to check it out.
Thanks for the rec!
Thanks for the recommendation. I wasn't aware. Will check it out.
The day I got done with the book, someone told me there's an audiobook version narrated by Hugh Laurie. It was absolutely as good as the book, and the book was easily the funniest I've read.
Must check that out! Thanks!
To say nothing of the dog! Super funny book but even more funny if you have been to England.
I read this when I was 16 and I found the book hilarious. I wonder about me at 44 if I'll still find it funny
YES!! I thought I'd never see this without having to post it :)
My all time fav, Sunday afternoon read.
Jerome K Jerome is the author. His another book is "Idle thoughts of an Idle fellow". That is funny too.
Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal by Christopher Moore
Christopher Moore books are generally very funny.
Have you read Fool by Christopher Moore? I’ve been listening to the audiobook. The wit, the turn of phrase and the innuendos are so good! I might just be childish but it’s hilarious!
I got Fool for my husband for a blind date with a book as a Christmas present (wrap books in plain brown bags, write a couple clues on them). He says it's the funniest book he's ever read.
That sounds like an awesome Christmas! And I definitely agree! It’s great! And I just found out that there are two more books in the series
Ngl, he loved it. It's going to be my go to thing for all presents for his now.
The Stupidest Angel was my first Christopher Moore book and has always been my favorite.
It's my favourite book, it's just so funny and absurd and I love the characters. 10/10
When I read the title of the post, this is the first book that came to mind.
This is the answer
This was my vote as well! So effing, side-spitting, funny.
Love this nd all of his books.
Yes!
Confederacy of dunces
My favorite novel. That said, I’m a Tulane grad and uh I could lose a lot of weight.
Walking into Werlein’s Music Store on Canal Street, where Ignatius buys his lute string, was literally like walking into a Time Machine set 75 years in the past. Amazing place.
I will always tag onto this recommendation to say the audiobook really added to the hilarity for me. Narrator does such a fantastic job
I still hear him when I read someone said My God!
I saw Nick Offerman play Ignatius J. Reilly in Boston years ago.
This pithy reply has done in my valve.
+1! Absolutely hilarious
Yep. Loved it!
Obligatory Terry Pratchett.
We Are Never Meeting In Real Life - Samantha Irby. She's super funny.
Second the Samantha Irby, her stuff makes me laugh a lot! 💙
And as a bonus, all her book covers are excellent.
Oh yeah - thanks for the reminder, they are! 💖
(and effective, my library choices do start with the literally ✨shiniest✨ books, lol 🤣🤣)
((Have heard a million positive recommendations for Terry Pratchett, no idea how I've never read any of his stuff, but I haven't...help me out and tell me what book to start with, pretty please? 😅 (if he's got a bunch of series, I like the sound of the 🐢 holding up the 🌍)))
There's a calculator thing to tell you which TP book you should read with depending on your likes.
wow, thank you so much!!! 💖
I hope an awesome book comes randomly your way soon! (🤣are you listening universe, make it so, or 💖🐢💖🐢🐢💖🐢💖???)
This is best wish ♥️♥️♥️♥️
for me, (and I wish I could find the link to it again) it said my first book should be: Moving Pictures. It's on my TBR list.
I loved the Bromeliad Trilogy by him. As in, loved, loved, loved. But, I cannot get into disc world - tried three times - and all my favourite people read him and I so want to be part of that gang. So, I will try once more.
The best of all book covers ever!
Breakfast of champions by Kurt Vonnegut was very funny to me
Yeah, except for all the cripplingly sad parts
In a Sunburned Country by Bill Bryson
You can't really go wrong with Bill Bryson. A Walk in the Woods had me in tears on public transit from laughing so much
Me too, with Neither Here Nor There!
Same. As well as The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid.
I think he’s the only author that who makes me c actually guffaw.
Real-life hooting and hollering
I came here to suggest this, actually surprised to see it mentioned!!! This book had me crying and I genuinely can't remember any specific one-liners from it because he's just so good at talking about academic facts and everyday life in a hilarious way.
Cold Comfort Farm
I saw something nasty in the woodshed!
Anything by PG Wodehouse.
For non-fiction, there's also the Heroic Failures books by Stephen Pile and anything by Mark Forsythe, but especially 'The Etymologicon' and 'The Elements of Eloquence'.
Pigs Have Wings is a favorite Wodehouse book.
hitchhiker guide
The only one here commented so far that I’ve actually read. This is the funniest book I’ve ever read
Seconding this. I found the audiobooks narrated by Douglas Adams himself, and it made them even more funny.
This 100%!
Hands down, the most hysterically funny book in the universe. I actually fell out bed, I was laughing so hard. This was before I saw the TV series.
Catch-22
And don't tell me God works in mysterious ways", Yossarian continued, hurtling over her objections. "There's nothing so mysterious about it. He's not working at all. He's playing or else He's forgotten all about us. That's the kind of God you people talk about—a country bumpkin, a clumsy, bungling, brainless, conceited, uncouth hayseed. Good God, how much reverence can you have for a Supreme Being who finds it necessary to include such phenomena as phlegm and tooth decay in His divine system of creation? What in the world was running through that warped, evil, scatological mind of His when He robbed old people of the power to control their bowel movements? Why in the world did he ever create pain? … Oh, He was really being charitable to us when He gave us pain! [to warn us of danger] Why couldn't He have used a doorbell instead to notify us, or one of His celestial choirs? Or a system of blue-and-red neon tubes right in the middle of each person's forehead. Any jukebox manufacturer worth his salt could have done that. Why couldn't He? … What a colossal, immortal blunderer! When you consider the opportunity and power He had to really do a job, and then look at the stupid, ugly little mess He made of it instead, His sheer incompetence is almost staggering.
Thanks for adding the text. I read Catch when I was very young and didn’t like it, but based on that text I’m gonna give it a go as an adult.
Catch-22 is one of my absolute favorite books of all time, and I did mention it on this thread too, but to be fair, I admit I’d have to call it more poignant and clever vs laugh-out-loud hilarious. It cuts too close to disturbing truths to be hilarious.
Major major major!
Made me laugh out loud many times. Some of the most clever humor I’ve ever seen.
Same here. One of the few “laugh out loud” books for me
I really must go back and read it again. Such a great book.
I’ve yet to read, but came here for this
This is Going to Hurt by Adam Kay
Was very funny, I agree!
Dress your family in courdoroy and denim
David Sedaris
Listening to David Sedaris is a must. He’s recorded a lot of his work. The Santaland Diaries is a perennial favorite of mine. And I enjoy his books even more when it’s his voice in my head, instead of the voice I gave him before hearing him.
Me Talk Pretty One Day continues to slay me
That's my favorite Sedaris to this day, then Naked.
That book is absolutely hilarious!
Funniest writer of all time.
Not read but listened to, Holidays on Ice by David Sedaris. I was driving. I’ve read it since then, and his voice and inflection# put it over the top for me. I ended up having to pull over because I was laughing so hard I couldn’t see. My eyes were watering and my face hurt! And each time I thought I had in under control, I’d start laughing all over again. Me, bad part of town, and I can imagine I wasn’t approached because I looked like a maniacal psychopath.
The 100 Year Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared by Jonas Jonasson is pretty hilarious.
Don Quixote survives for a reason, too.
Terry Fallis' No Relation is pretty good, too. It's about a guy named Earnest Hemmingway, who, tired of questions about his name, starts a self-help group for people with celebrity names. People like: Mahatma Gandhi, Diana Ross, Marie Antoinette , Clark Kent, Jackie Kennedy, Mario Andretti... etc..
I really thought the 100 year old man was very funny. It was such an entertaining book!
I couldn't believe how funny Don Quixote still is. I thoroughly enjoyed it.
It's interesting also in the way that you see how the modern format of a novel hadn't developed yet. He goes around, misunderstands something completely, and makes himself a fool. Repeat. That's pretty much the plot. You couldn't write a book like that today.
Most things by David Sedaris. Calypso has been my most recent favorite. He does the reading for his audiobooks, it's great.
Honestly I laughed quite hard at John Scalzis Starter Villain
Lamb by Christopher Moore
Anything by David Sedaris, especially if it’s an audiobook that he narrates
I love David Sedaris. He makes me laugh over and over.
I didn't see your comment when I made mine and I thought it was me because it was so eerily similar lol
Second this!
Born a Crime by Trevor Noah (audiobook).
Actually “read”, HHGTTG by Douglas Adams, Year Zero by Rob Reid, or Hounded by Kevin Hearne.
We have very similar tastes Internet stranger. You might like Space Opera.
Hah, thanks for the recommendation. Perhaps now we’re internet acquaintances XD
Oh my gosh, born a crime was an amazing memoir. The first story of his mum throwing him out of the car was an excellent book opener.
Good Omens by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman is great if you’re into dry British humor.
I also really enjoyed the Dungeon Crawler Carl books by Matt Dinniman, although I’d highly recommend the audiobooks in that instance because the narrator makes a huge difference. These are good if you’re into video games, Millennial pop culture references, and/or vulgar humor in the style of Rick and Morty.
I wouldn't necessarily describe it as "light", but Our Dumb Century (from the Onion) is by far the funniest book I've ever read.
Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy
Second this.
Glitterati by Oliver K. Langmead
A Clockwork Orange and RuPaul’s Drag Race meet Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind in this fabulous dystopian fable about fashion, family and feckless billionaires.
Simone is one of the Glitterati, the elite living lives of luxury and leisure. Slave to the ever-changing tides – and brutal judgements – of fashion, he is immaculate. To be anything else is to be unfashionable, and no one wants to be unfashionable, or even worse, ugly…
When Simone accidentally starts a new fashion with a nosebleed at a party, another Glitterati takes the credit. Soon their rivalry threatens to raze their opulent utopia to the ground, as no one knows how to be vicious like the beautiful ones.
Enter a world of the most fantastic costumes, grand palaces in the sky, the grandest parties known to mankind and the unbreakable rules of how to eat ice cream. A fabulous dystopian fable about fashion, family and the feckless billionaire class.
this is honestly the most hilarious, absurd, surreal, insane book i have ever read. i was literally in bed shaking and cry-laughing. this book is a fucking masterpiece and is such a hidden gem!!
Consistently funny throughout: The Sellout by Paul Beatty
Hardest I’ve laughed during any media: Antkind by Charlie Kaufman
At last, someone mentioned The Sellout! It's the one book I am always recommending for laugh out loud humor. It made my very straight laced friend fall off his couch laughing.
Really? I’ll check it out. I read one of his essays, and it reached out off the page as profoundly vulnerable and funny.
My Family and Other Animals by Gerald Durrell
Lamb by Christopher Moore. Love it love it love it.
The World According to Garp by John Irving.
Confederacy of Dunces.
Came here to say this. By John Kennedy Toole
E, by Matt Beaumont
A week or so at an ad agency, as they try to pitch for the Coka Cola account… told entirely through emails…
From the 1st page I was laughing my ass off.
For some reason, I believe you. I'll give it a try.
Hotel New Hampshire by John Irving.
Mort by Terry Pratchett
Anything written by Jenny Lawson. Her books are piss your pants funny.
Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris
Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris.
Sh*t My Dad Says
Only read in a space where you can laugh out loud.
Catch-22
This one makes you laugh but leaves behind a lot of pain and gloom
I was reluctantly in the Army. The book is all too familiar.
And Then She Found Me by Eleanor Lipman
Sex Lives of Cannibals
Anything written by David Sedaris
One of them: Me Talk Pretty One Day
So good.
Dungeon Crawler Carl
Candide - Voltaire. Darkly hilarious
Hitchhiker’s Guide
Paddington Goes to Town, by Michael Bond.
For something darker, Catch-22, by Joseph Heller.
How do I Un-Remember This by Danny Pellegrino
Nothing to See Here by Kevin Wilson
Loveee Danny Pellegrino! And his holiday book "The Jolliest Bunch: Unhinged Holiday Stories" is more funny to me!!
Yes!! Loved that one too. He is so funny.
Youth in Revolt by C.D Payne featuring Oakland's youngest sociopath, Nick Twist (499 pages with an LOL on almost every page).
Hells yes. A friend gave me this book in college around ‘98 and it was so great. Everyone who had read that copy had put their name on the endpage and passed it on. There are a lot more followups out now, some involving Nick’s little brother, but nothing has matched the magic of the original.
Anything by Patrick F. McManus.
These are my top three funniest books. These are my 3 favorite fun audiobooks. First 2 are mysteries, the last is a modern day telling of Thelma and Louise. “Vera Wong’s Unsolicited Advice for Murderers,” by Jesse Q. Sutanto. ABSOLUTELY MUST be experienced on audiobook., Vera talks to herself and it’s always snarky. Simply reading her inner dialogue is nothing compared to hearing the snark of the narrator. The other fun mystery is “Mrs. “Mrs. Plansky’s Revenge,” by Spenser Quinn. Finally “The Mostly True Story of Tanner and Louise,” by Coleen Oakley is modern day female buddy road trip. all are wonderful!
Confederacy of Dunces
"The Time Machine Did It", by John Schwartzwelder. He was a writer for the Simpsons back in the golden age of the first 9 seasons or so, and is credited for a lot of the funniest episodes from them.
Thanks for the backstory. Can’t wait to check it out. My first crush was on Homer Simpson — (meaning some Simpsons writer)
It is not to everyone's taste, but "A Confederacy Of Dunces" is absolutely hilarious to me.
A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court by Mark Twain. Great sense of humor and great book
Bossypants by Tina Fey
Carl Hiasan’s Skinny Dip. It is a laugh out loud book. All of his books are funny. Several years ago he retired as a writer for The Miami Herald. The libraries usually have all his novels.
Callahan's Crosstime Saloon by Spider Robinson
Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ’s Childhood Pal
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.
Sick Puppy by Carl Hiassen.
It’s for children but Junie B Jones. I still read them sometimes as an adult. They’re hilarious
Anything written by Bill Bryson, but A Walk in the Woods is one that sticks with me
I have this one to my husband to read; it’s the only book I have EVER heard him laugh out loud reading. I felt victorious with that recommendation.
Lamb by Christopher Moore
Even Cowgirls Get The Blues - Tom Robbins (1976) I couldn't stop laughing within 15 minutes of starting the book!
Anything by Bryson or Sedaris
Me Talk Pretty One Day - David Sedaris
Unreliable Memoirs by Clive James is not the funniest book I’ve ever read but it’s probably the funniest autobiography. James was an Australian writer, poet, broadcaster and journalist who mostly lived and worked in the UK. Died a few years ago.
The Stupidest Angel by Christopher Moore,
Tho to be honest almost anything by him makes me laugh to one degree or another
Even though it's sad at times, I feel that "A Man Called Ove" by Fredrik Backman fits this bill.
conspiracy against the Human Race
Based on a True Story by Norm Macdonald. He reads the audiobook too, it’s a great way to take it in. Some plot points are based on things that actually happened, but it’s not a memoir. Reads more like a novel.
Anything by Delicious Tacos is pretty funny.
Apathy and Other Small Victories by Paul Neilan
I remember John Dies at the End really getting me
I only have read of hilarious characters, but not “funny” books overall. I should change that.
Either Mason & Dixon by Thomas Pynchon or Pnin by Vladimir Nabokov. Neither is strictly funny (they both have serious moments) but there are many very funny parts in both.
The “Pirates!” series by Gideon Defoe.
I like humor, so it's hard to pick one. Instead, I'm going to recommend authors by genre. You can open any book by then and have fun.
Fantasy/Scifi Yahtzee Croshaw
Outdoors/Sporting Patrick McManus
History Daniel O'Brien
Let's Pretend This Never Happened by Jenny Lawson
At Swim-Two-Birds by Flann O'Brien
Bossypants Tina Fey
Letters from earth - Mark Twain
The funniest (and dirtiest) is definitely Fool by Christopher Moore. Not sure how light it is, it’s based on King Lear.
Three dumb bunnies
Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy
Good Omens Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett.
As novels go, "Straight Man", by Richard Russo. But it's dry humor, so not everyone would like it.
Straight up humor? Probably Calvin and Hobbs.
A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court-Mark Twain.
Me talk pretty one day - David Sedaris
I hope they serve beer in hell, written by an absolute douch nozzle but it was hilarious. Don’t watch the movie.
I don’t think I’ve seen a more accurate descriptor for a total douche nozzle of a man.
John Dies at the End. Love that series.
Good Omens by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaimon.
It was Good Omens that got me hooked on Pratchett.
Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy by Douglas Adams
Callahan’s Crosstime Saloon by Spider Robinson
Immortality Inc. by Robert Sheckley
Catch 22
Get any book by Tom Sharpe.
I started with "Wilt", but laughed like a maniac with every single one of his books.
The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents by Terry Pratchett
Differently Morphous by Yahtzee Croshaw
Probably The Spellman Files by Lisa Lutz
I really enjoyed the princess bride
Anything by Terry Pratchet
Let’s Pretend This Never Happened. So laugh out loud funny
Maybe not the funniest, but the one I wasn't expecting to be funny was Jurassic Park. I'm reading the sequel now and forgot just how funny some of Crichton's one liners are, especially when they follow a horrifyingly graphic paragraph of death and pain. It's like "sir, these dinosaurs you describe so cutely aRE EATING BA-" spoilers, so I'll hush haha.
This is going to hurt - Adam Kay. It had me laughing out loud
Dress Me Up In Corduroy by David Sedaris
Not a whole book, but I laugh out loud a lot at some of David Foster Wallace’s nonfiction, e.g. A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again.
Peter Mayle and P.G. Wodehouse are both great for light-hearted fun. Even if Wodehouse's characters have rather outdated ideas.
Hyperbole and a Half by Allie Brosh