Glens Falls (NY) Online Book Discussion Group discussion

Sara Brown wrote (in another topic):
==========================================================
"I admit that I am a sucker for P.G. Wodehouse, so when I recently discovered some of his books that I haven't yet read in my local library I snatched them up. I am currently reading Love Among the Chickens. Wodehouse's stories are generally short and they always leave you wanting more. And, as difficult as it is to write comedy, he is the best. Admittedly, if you read more than three in a row (again, they are so short that it is easy to do this in a few days) it can get a little tiresome. Nevertheless, I always go back to him when I need a good laugh.
Joy, maybe another discussion could be recommending good comedies. These really are hard to find. And I do find them necessary and helpful in my stressful, busy life. I'm sure others might agree(?). Sara"
==========================================================

I think Sara's above idea is a good one. So I've started this thread, as she suggested. Can you recommend some good humorous books or comedies?

I agree that funny is hard to write & it varies a lot from person to person. Monty Python leaves me cold & so did Seinfeld.

Some that I did like:
Piers Anthony wrote a series about the magical land of Xanth starting with A Spell for Chameleon, I think. I really liked the first few, but it got old after that. It's very punny (yes, with a 'P').

Spider Robinson wrote Callahan's Crosstime Saloon & it was both funny & thoughtful. I liked the first couple, but it lost my interest after that. I think you'd like this, Joy.

Dean Koontz can be quite humorous, especially his Odd Thomas character.

I'm partial to George Carlin's books for total comedy. He has a unique way of looking at things and his use of language is phenomenal. I have When Will Jesus Bring the Pork Chops? sitting on my shelf for a while now, I'll get to it one of these days when I need a guaranteed laugh.

I read a book by Woody Allen, early 80's. I can't remember the name of it or even what it was about. I'd read it on the subway to and from work, and a few times I laughed out loud because it was so funny. I can hear his voice in my head, saying what I was reading.

I remember laughing out loud when I read _Seinlanguage_ by Jerry Seinfeld.

Dave Barry also comes to mind here, but I haven't read any of his books.

I enjoyed the humor in the biography of comedian, Mel Brooks:
_It's Good to Be the King The Seriously Funny Life of Mel Brooks_
by James Robert Parish.

Thanks, Jackie. I'm getting Carlin's book from Paperbackswap. He's always been a favorite of mine.

I've read one Dave Barry book. It was OK, but got old pretty quick. I used to like him in the paper. I guess my sense of humor trips out after a while.

I've always loved George Carlin as a stand-up comic, but I never thought to read a book by him. Didn't even know there was one. Now I see that he wrote quite a few. Where have I been?

Same place as me apparently, Joy. It's a nice rock I live under. How's yours? ;-)

I keep running into this over & over. There's over 250,000 books published every year & has been for the past few years in the US & England. That's on top of all the existing ones. How can we keep up?!!!

Jim, it's impossible to keep up. As I look back, I can't even believe I've read so many books. I've never been a steady reader, but have always wanted to be one. There are just too many other distractions. Besides, I'm a slow reader and I stop to copy quotes which appeal to me. In the end, we just have to satisfy ourselves. Anyone who tries to keep up with all of these books is asking for failure.

IMHO Ben Elton writes tales that are intelligent, funny, moving, and pacy. Just what I want when I need something I can sit down, read cover to cover in a fairly short space of time and come away with a smile on my face.

Sue

Thanks, Sue. Here's a photo-link to the author, Ben Elton.

Not much of a photo, but it is a link to him and his books. Thanks for telling us about him. Did you say "racy"? Oh, no... you said "pacy". (lol) In any case, he sounds very entertaining.

I'm listening to Carlin's "Brain Droppings" right now. He's reading it, so it sounds just like a stand up routine by him. Love it! Definitely the way to go with him.

Jim wrote: "I'm listening to Carlin's "Brain Droppings" right now. He's reading it, so it sounds just like a stand up routine by him. Love it! Definitely the way to go with him."

Is that on a cassette or a CD, Jim?

Is an audio CD called an MP3? I'm confused about CDs and DVDs. They all look alike. We have CDs on which we've saved photographs. What kind of CD is that? In other words, what are all the different kinds of CDs and how can we tell the difference?

I love listening to George Carlin. He was one of a kind.

Did anyone catch the Mark Twain Award for American Humor for George Carlin on PBS last week? It was good, showing old clips of George in stand up. He is an icon in comedy, so unique and intelligent.
He died one week after it was announced he was getting the Mark Twain Award. He was just one of those people seemed as if he would go on forever. I'm still having a heard time accepting that I'll never see anything new from him again.

Jackie wrote: "Did anyone catch the Mark Twain Award for American Humor for George Carlin on PBS last week? It was good, showing old clips of George in stand up. He is an icon in comedy, so unique and intellige..."

Sorry to say, I missed it, Jackie. Maybe it will air again sometime.

I have it on CD, Joy. Yes, CD's & DVD's look a lot a like - they are alike - just storage media. Picture CD's are data files, but they're all just holding data files, when you get right down to it.

Audio CD's are just a special format called CDA. Very large, but supposed to be better sounding. You can fit a dozen songs on a CD in CDA format or several hundred in MP3 or other data formats. They vary in size & quality. You can also put movies on them, but they only hold about 650 - 700 mb (megabytes) of data. So, people usually don't because you have to cut down the quality to get them to fit.

DVD's are the same, but they generally hold about 4 gb (gigabytes) of data in a single layer or 8gb in a dual layer DVD. Lots more room (about 6 to 12 times as much) & most players that can read a DVD can also read a CD.

Special, specific formats like CDA for music or the DVD picture formats are recognized by players like have in a car stereo or you hook to your TV. There's a lot of other file types or formats that you can use too, but you run into only being able to play some on a PC or in newer players.

I see, Jim. Thanks for explaining. So it all comes down to different data formats on the CDs and DVDs... and some hold more than others.

I went to acronym.com and found:
CD = Compact Disc.
DVD = Digital Versatile Disc (formerly Digital Video Disc)
MP (in MP3) means Media Player

Joy H. (of Glens Falls) wrote: "Sara Brown wrote (in another topic):
==========================================================
I find Janet Evanovich to be the funniest. Grandma Mazur is a hoot and Lula is a side splitting riot. I enjoyed them so much that I had to read all 14 and paid $25.00 for the last one as soon as it came out. Her romances are too silly but the heroine of these books is Stephanie Plum and she is too funny!

Alice wrote: "I find Janet Evanovich to be the funniest. Grandma Mazur is a hoot..."

I read Evanovich's Two for the Dough a while ago.
Perhaps I should try another one of her books.

Did you vote on the funniest books list?

Alice wrote: "Did you vote on the funniest books list? "

Alice - Can you give us a link to that list please?

I love Stella Gibbons' 1932 classic Cold Comfort Farm, a hilarious send-up of the "rural gothic" novels of Hardy, Lawrence and Mary Webb. It's about a very efficient modern young lady, Flora, who goes down into darkest Sussex to meet her hitherto unmet maternal relatives the Starkadders of Cold Comfort Farm, who turn out to be badly in need of some brisk sorting out. The literary satire is delicious, but the novel also stands solidly on its own and the characters are to die for - from Old Aunt Ada Doom, whose life has been blighted by an unfortunate childhood event, to the fire-breathing Uncle Amos (his extemporaneous sermon to the Church of the Quivering Brethren is unforgettable); from the determinedly diaphanous Elfine to over-sexed Seth. There's even a thinly veiled send-up of Lawrence himself in the character of Mr Meyerburg, a writer who can't look at anything, and I mean anything, in nature without seeing it as a sexual symbol.
There was quite a good BBC film of it years ago with the great Alistair Sim as Uncle Amos, and a less good commercial film more recently with Ian McKellen in that role and Rufus Sewell flaring his nostrils magnificently as sullenly smoldering Seth.

Margaret wrote: "I love Stella Gibbons' 1932 classic Cold Comfort Farm, a h..."

Margaret, thanks for the review of _Cold Comfort Farm_. I have found the DVD at Netflix and put it on my Netflix queue. The Netflix descriptions says:
===================================================
"Cold Comfort Farm(1995) PG
When Flora Poste (Kate Beckinsale), a young society woman in 1930s London, becomes suddenly orphaned, she's forced to take up residence with a group of her unsophisticated, oddball relatives at their farm. Despite protests from the bedridden, iron-willed matriarch of the farm, the aspiring lass tries to achieve some semblance of order and class in the house -- and in her own life. Cast also includes Eileen Atkins, Ian McKellen and Joanna Lumley."
FROM:
====================================================

The 카지노싸이트 description says:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"A hilarious parody of D. H. Lawrence and Thomas Hardy's earthy, melodramatic novels, the deliriously entertaining Cold Comfort Farm is “very probably the funniest book ever written” (The Sunday Times)."
FROM: http://www.africa-eu.com/book/show/92...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~