Hiya folks,
When I was a student, I had to dedicate way too much time to excessively dense and contrived literature. I more or less vowed for a while not to bother reading again if I could avoid it.
A few years have gone by and, well, I have been getting into reading again. However, particularly dense or serious material kind of irritates me. I'm looking for some funny material.
Actually, I should say I'm looking for
more funny material. I've got a small stack of books and ebooks waiting for me to run through them yet, but I always like the prospect of stockpiling more.
I've been reading Pratchett's Discworld series, and I rather enjoy the City Watch and Death books, though they don't really draw out laughs from me. I also liked "Good Omens" a lot, though I can't remember any jokes that got me to laugh out loud. Much the same way with P.G. Wodehouse so far: I appreciate the jokes and the situations, but I tend to keep a straight face or just smirk.
Being an uncivilized brute, I found myself in stitches reading Christopher Moore's "Lamb" at times...not as a jab at religion but merely as an amusing, somewhat zany story (seemed to slow down a bit at the end with the jokes though). I've got another book or two of his that I'll be tearing into soon enough, since I expect I'll enjoy them.
I went through David Sedaris's "Me Talk Pretty One Day", and though the first half rarely drew more than half a smile, I really enjoyed several stories in the second half.
I'm currently going through "A Walk in the Woods" by Bill Bryson. While it's a very enjoyable read with lots of interesting historical anecdotes and observations and a few laughs, I'm really not cracking up the way I had originally expected. Not a bad thing, but I had picked it up with slightly different expectations.
I've got the first MYTH book by Robert Asprin waiting for me, as well as "A Confederacy of Dunces", Three Men in a Boat, Topper, and Neil Gaiman's "Anansi Boys". I've also got some more Pratchett waiting for me, and a few other books laying around like the first and second Xanth books.
I lean slightly more towards fantasy, and am slightly hesitant about science fiction. However, I think of myself as reasonably open-minded regarding genre, as long as it doesn't take itself too seriously.
I guess I'm probably being too particular in any case. Anyone got any recommendations?