Books that made you laugh out loud

[toolazytothinkofausername]

Please can you suggest a book that made you laugh out loud. I need more laughter in my life right now, and I am bored of streaming TV/film

Dowser The Plague and I was the first Betty McDonald book I read - her account of having TB in the 1930s doesn’t seem like it would be funny but it was, and so interesting! There’s another one she wrote (Anyone Can Do Anything) about trying to find a job in Seattle during the Depression and that’s brilliant as well. She was so witty

I loved The egg and I (Betty Macdonald) as a kid. I looked her up a few years ago and she was a horrendous racist apparently which put me right off her.

@KeflavikAirport

I loved The egg and I (Betty Macdonald) as a kid. I looked her up a few years ago and she was a horrendous racist apparently which put me right off her.

Oh no way, really? I don’t remember anything really about race the books of hers I read!

Bill Bryson's books all made me laugh

Janet Evanovich’s Stephanie Plum series
Marian Keyes, especially the Walsh Family books
Sophie Kinsella’s Shopaholic series

Will be looking up Emma Kennedy and Bill Bryson’s books now!

I guess Betty McDonald was of her time in her attitudes towards Native Americans for instants. I do remember one bit about a Japanese prisoner of war who was cleaning her house and did a terrible job.

@FourDaysOfChicken

Dowser The Plague and I was the first Betty McDonald book I read - her account of having TB in the 1930s doesn’t seem like it would be funny but it was, and so interesting! There’s another one she wrote (Anyone Can Do Anything) about trying to find a job in Seattle during the Depression and that’s brilliant as well. She was so witty

@FourDaysOfChicken so lovely to hear about Betty MacDonald here!

I LOVE The plague and I but also The egg and I. I recently also read a biography about her

Another vote for Three Men on a boat

@KeflavikAirport

I loved The egg and I (Betty Macdonald) as a kid. I looked her up a few years ago and she was a horrendous racist apparently which put me right off her.

@KeflavikAirport I think that's probably an exaggeration. I recently read a biography about her and didn't get this sense at all

Remember she lived in a completely different time where blatant racism was more part of acceptable daily speech unfortunately so I wonder whether that's what was going on? Certainly in her books though I didn't get that sense at all

I do think we can't judge authors' work on the basis of their (alleged) character

Ah ok, I haven’t read The Egg and I and it looks like that’s the problematic one (or certainly one she used language totally unacceptable now). Just googling it now, seems she was sued for libel too for how she wrote about her neighbours in that one!

Sure she was writing by the standards of her day, but I think reading it now would leave a bit of a sour taste in your mouth.

@KeflavikAirport was there something in particular you felt was racist?

Of course if we consider how people used to talk about and write about native Americans at the time there will be nothing standing for us to read- see Steinbeck, Larry McMurtry etc

And Enid Blyton too of course

I personally don't think that's a way for us to think about books but I think of course it's a very complex and valid debate

Gosh I haven’t read them for decades. Like I said the only bit I really remember was some poor Japanese woman who was interned and was having to clean peoples houses for the first time and he was not making a very good job of it.

I'm reading Nancy Mitford at the moment. Love in a Cold Climate and Don't Tell Alfred both made me LOL a few times. The family relationships and characters are really well observed.

David Sedaris, Me Talk Pretty One Day had me in stitches at times.

David Lodge, Changing Places made me laugh (there was a particular scene with a paternoster lift). It was years ago that I read it.

I will try some Bill Bryson next.

Anything by Tom Sharpe

Charlie Connely's the shipping forecast

The Disaster Artist: My Life Inside The Room by Greg Sestero and Tom Bissell.

Loads of good recommendations here.

Cold Comfort Farm never fails to make me laugh.

Yes, Bill Bryson’s Notes From A Small Island.

Three Men In A Boat (Jerome K. Jerome)
Cold Comfort Farm (Stella Gibbon)

The Tent The Bucket and Me by Emma Kennedy. The book made me laugh out loud a lotty lot. The audio version is even funnier as Jane Kennedy reads it . Highly recommend it to everyone. Enjoy

My brother bought me Daft Wee Stories by Limmy and its bloody hilarious. You need a dark dour sense of humour though!

Doreen Tovey. She's written several books about the trials and tribulations of life with Siamese cats.

Toast - Nigel Slater. Also quite sad in parts. I often go back to the sections which are funny just for an instant giggle.

@Clawdy

Diary of a Nobody by George Grossmith. Can't believe something written all those years ago is so hilarious. Charles Pooter is a Victorian David Brent!

Yes! That's such a good description. I think he's a bit more likeable than David Brent, but certainly his social awkwardness and his conviction of his own hilarity ring true. I love the part where he accidentally buys a vulgar Christmas card featuring fat multicultural babies 😆

I agree with the Discworld but can't get along with Douglas Adams at all. I don't know why.

Yes to David Sedaris as well. The Santaland Diaries made me weak with laughter.

@Clawdy

Diary of a Nobody by George Grossmith. Can't believe something written all those years ago is so hilarious. Charles Pooter is a Victorian David Brent!

Was just coming on to recommend this one. Just hilarious and people obviously found the same stuff funny as we do how which is fascinating to me.

David Sadaris Calypso made me laugh too