I dont really laugh when reading ..do you?

[Sidebeforeself]

Ive read so many “funny”books but I rarely laugh out loud. Im always disappointed when being told books are funny. Books by Woodhouse and Jerome K Jerome dont raise a smile even though I like them.

I think Ive only ever laughed at two books - Love, Nina and Where D’You Go Bernadette . I did laugh at Adam Kays first book but that was because real life is funny not because of his writing.

Anyone else like this?

Yeah, I rarely LOL at books even though I enjoy comic novels. I think the humour has to be a bit unexpected for it to make me laugh out loud.

I do. I largely read Bridget Jones's Diary on the bus to and from work and couldn't hold it in, especially not the bit about the dinner party. Perfectly normal.

I laughed out loud several times reading the Heartstopper series.

I’m listening to the audio book of The Satsuma Complex and I’ve laughed out loud in my car a few times. Really enjoying it.

JD Kirk books make me laugh out loud at least twice a book. They're the only ones I've found that do, fantastic books.

Thanks both - I have just ordered this!

Good to see Bill Bryson getting a couple of mentions. I don't often laugh at books but his have had me with tears running down my face many times. I once had to put one away while reading it on a train because I was absolutely helpless. Then I kept remembering the bit that had made me laugh and letting out these weird little whimpering noises which must have looked way stranger than just laughing at a book 😂

David Lodge books made me laugh out loud. Agree about Bill Bryson as well. I remember howling at his description of what position he needed to be to watch TV in his motel room in Des Moines (I think).

Bill Bryson is very funny and I have laughed aloud at him in lots of his books.

John Boyne The Echo Chamber was hilarious and I loved it so much I had never read any of his books before and was disappointed to find all his other books are serious.

A couple of months ago I read Sandi's Toksvig's 'Between the Stops' after listening to my partner cackle her way through it, but it didn't get so much as a smirk out of me.

Actually it's slightly worrying that I can't think of the last time I laughed at a book, either. I just scrolled back through my Goodreads and had to go all the way back to February 2024 for something that might have got a laugh out of me; David Mitchell's 'Unruly' - and even then, I'm not sure.

It's weird because I read a lot and I don't think I'm completely miserable. But, no, I'm not regularly creasing up at books, either.

@Sminty2 I came here to mention that very book! I was laughing so much in Waterstones I had to buy it. Glad I did, I've read all three in the series but that was my favourite.

Also 'Gold Coast' by Nelson de Mille. Very, very funny.

I agree with Bill bryson I love his books , I also really like Gerald durral .
@Sidebeforeself I think a lot of it depends on your mood at the time and I think sometimes if your expectations are set to ' you will make me laugh ! ' it will be disappointing.
It's a bit like sitting down to a full Sunday roast that you have spent ages cooking and you no longer want it.

That thread is great !

I read the first Bridget Jones book and got to the blue soup bit when sat in a cafeteria on a ferry quite late at night.
I was trying my best not to laugh out loud but the laugh kept bursting out and people were looking at me.

K.J. Parker got me when describing an ambush where they started running down a hill but it had been raining and they sort of couldn't stop.
It was very unexpected as the book is absolutely not a comedy.

Terry Pratchett, Tom Sharpe, Craig Shaw Gardener have all made me laugh many, many times, although most of it only raises a smile on a second readthrough.

Maeve Binchy mixes moments of real comedy in some of her books although they aren't meant to be comedies.
A lecture one character gave her kids about looking after their tortoise made me laugh, as did one younger child trying to defect to a different religion to avoid paying for breaking something in his parish church.

Ben Elton made me laugh back when he first published his books, but rereading them they seem very shallow so I think they didn't age very well.

There are others I can't recall at the moment, but those moments, expected or unexpected when a book can cause me to laugh out loud are one of the greatest joys I find in reading.

I've got this and haven't read it yet. Need to put my bloody phone down...

Only if it’s really funny. I did laugh at Bridget Jones diary.

Another Bill Bryson fan here. Just re-reading Down Under and laughing out loud especially his description of cricket, I had to keep putting the book down.

I definitely have.

Bill Bryson, in one book, about the plumbing. I wish I remembered the details. So funny.

And I have never cried at a book!

I read The Restraint of Beasts on a sun lounger on holiday and laughed so much people went over to see what it was while I was in the pool!

The last Dawn French I read had me on tears at the end. I'm not really a soppy person but... Oh, it opened those floodgates!

Was that the one about the adopted daughter? Yes that was very moving. I found her earlier book A Tiny Bit Marvellous hilarious

PG Wodehouse, Jerome K Jerome and the Adrian Mole books are my top ones for laughing out loud. also The Diary of A Nobody, I laughed uncontrollably on a train at the bit when Lupin shouts ‘see me dance the polka’. I love Barbara Pym too, and the Mah Jong scene in The Murder of Roger Ackroyd cracks me up every time. My DH thinks I am easily amused - I think I have a keen appreciation of the absurdity of everyday life which I enjoy to the full!

I often find myself snorting about things in a very undignified manner. A turn of phrase will tickle me and I'll make myself look a weirdo on the bus or in a cafe.