Everybody needs a good laugh once in a while. And a good book that can make you really, seriously shriek with laughter is a treasure. Books that will make you laugh is the theme of this week’s Top Ten Tuesday, so here’s some that have done it for me.
Now, I could easily have just written “P.G. Wodehouse” ten times and left it at that. Picking up a Wodehouse book is practically a guarantee of laughter. But I wanted to include a little variety on this list, so I’ve contented myself by bookending it with Wodehouse titles.
Right Ho, Jeeves by P.G. Wodehouse
This was my first taste of Wodehouse, and I still rank it as one of the funniest—if not the funniest—books I’ve ever read.
Once On a Time by A.A. Milne
Milne’s writing for adults is every bit as delightful as his writing for children, and this cheerful send-up of the classic fairytale is absolutely hilarious. Also in the running for funniest book I’ve ever read.
High Rising by Angela Thirkell
To get an idea of why I laughed so hard at this one, read the first quote in this post. A very-British comedy of manners and errors with a liberal dose of the woes of authors.
The Importance of Being Earnest by Oscar Wilde
“You can hardly imagine that I and Lord Bracknell would dream of allowing our only daughter—a girl brought up with the utmost care—to marry into a cloak-room, and form an alliance with a parcel?”
Three Men in a Boat by Jerome K. Jerome
Once you have read it, you will never forget the tin of pine-apple, or Uncle Podger hanging a picture. Trust me.
Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town by Stephen Leacock
A thoroughly affectionate and hugely entertaining satire of small-town life, set in Canada around the turn of the 20th century. Read my review here.
Gentle Julia by Booth Tarkington
I tend to prefer Tarkington’s “serious” novels to his humor, but this one, concerning the misadventures of a young girl playing matchmaker for her lovely and much-courted aunt, honestly made me shriek with laughter. Read my review here.
Bab: A Sub-Deb by Mary Roberts Rinehart
Another non-mystery Rinehart book that’s a real hoot—told in first-person by an irrepressible teenage girl in the pre-WWI era, who wishes her family would treat her as a grown-up, is enamored by Romance with a capital R, and is firmly convinced she knows how to spell. End result: getting into the wildest scrapes and driving said family to distraction.
Kathleen by Christopher Morley
A charming short read, in which a group of Oxford students go in search of the author of a stray letter signed “Kathleen” which captivated them—a search ending in screwball comedy. Read my review here.
Something Fresh by P.G. Wodehouse
(Also published under the title Something New.) All I can say is that the scene on the staircase left me quite incapable of speech, or anything else besides laughter, for several minutes.