Recommend me some books, please?

Question

Preferably classics but if you want to suggest anything else that would be appreciated as well. I'm looking for Classics that aren't extremely depressing. Infact, I'd enjoy things that are humorous.

Answer 1

Jane Austen's novels are all quite humorous, my favorites being Pride and Prejudice, Persuasion, and Sense and Sensibility.
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut (not a happy sounding title, but quite funny in many parts)
Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
The Odyssey by Homer
A Midsummer Night's Dream by Shakespeare
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
The Importance of Being Earnest by Oscar Wilde
and if you have read many classics, or at least have a basic knowledge of their story lines, the Thursday Next series and the Nursery Crimes series by Jasper Fforde are extremely funny. In the first, Thursday Next, a literature detective in Swindon, discovers she can travel into fiction, and must save Jane Eyre from being murdered by the evil Acheron Hades. In the second series, detective Jack Spratt is the head of the Nursery Crimes division and investigates the murder of Humpty Dumpty.

Answer 2

Vague, but here goes:

http://www.life-after-harry-potter.com

Included is a list of only the best sorcery fantasy books, grade reading level, a short review of each book along with a brief summary of adult content. There is also a "Reader's Choice" list of favorite books, and a list of heroine sorcery fantasy books.

Also these: http://www.interleaves.org/~rteeter/grtother.html#great . Lots of lists, but I especially like the Harvard Classics list - all the books that I should have read, but (mostly) never did.

Finally, these: http://www.awardannals.com/wiki/Honor_roll:Genres - pick your genre, find the best books ranked by how many awards they've won.

For "humorous classics", I highly recommend anything by Mark Twain and T H White. A Mark Twain gem that you probably never heard of is "Adam and Eve", a (very) humorous look at the very first marriage. Twain will be free online. T H White is hilarious, but not old enough to be free. Check out the first link for a review of his great works. I would also recommend *most* things by Rudyard Kipling (free online) and Jules Verne (quite humorous, and free online). The funniest of all of these is White, 2nd Verne (Journey to the Center of the Earth is a riot!)

I hope this helps.

Jim, http://www.jimpettis.com/wheel/

Answer 3

I second The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas.
You might also like The Scarlet Pimpernel by Baroness Orczy.

For modern humor, here are a few:

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams
Good Omens by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman
Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal by Christopher Moore
Boomsday by Christopher Buckley
A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson

Answer 4

Some good classics:
1. Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice (a must to read)
2. George Eliot's Silas Marner (has humour, explores redemptive love and the idea of religion)
3. George Orwell's 1984 (English dystopian novel)
I also like Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar (explores role of women through the imagery of the rose)
*Try not to read Great Expectations by Charles Dickens. I'm studying it now and it's boring me to death.
Some other interesting novels:
Mitch Albom's The Five People You Meet In Heaven. My favourite book, this was a times bestseller. Also check out "For One More Day".

Answer 5

The Anne of Green Gables series of books, by L.M. Montgomery is wonderful, classic and funny. It is about a young orphan girl who gets adopted by someone who wanted a boy...and all that happens after. It will also make you cry once in a while, but it's never depressing. These books follow Anne all the way through the lives of her 6 children. It will keep you in books for a long time!! I hope you try them, you'll love them all!

Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott is also another classsic that will give you a story about 4 sisters living during the time of the Civil War. It is such a sweet book and you will laugh and cry both!

Answer 6

I dont know how old u are. Hemingway and Faulkner are always good. They basically changed writing as we know it today. Light classics could be Raymond Chandler or Dash Hammit. Most classics are not depressing but uplifting if you get the meaning. The web should have a list of books you should read. Good luck.

Answer 7

Alone on a wide wide sea by Michael Morpurgo. 307 pages

hes a 60 yr old mad telling his story of how when he was a child he was seperated from his sis kitty. he gets taken to austtralia and put on farm at the age o5 i think. he is a slave he meets some good people and when hes older has a daughter and plans a trip bak to england to find his long lost sister and find our what the key means (when he left his sis she gave him a key- he calls it the lucky key)

but we he make the journey
that was a bit about the story
heres the blurb from the book:

THERE WERE DOZENS OF US ON THE SHIP, BOYS, GIRLS. WE WERE OF TO AUSTRALIA, IT MIGHT AS WELL BEEN THE MOON.

Orphaned in WW11, Arthur is separated from his sister and sent to the other side of the world. There his extraordanary journey continues as his friend Marty Survive brutal captivity on a working farm find a new family with eccentic Aunty Meg and her animals, and discover their talent for designing yachts.

Sixty years later, Arthur's Daunghter Allie sets sail single-handed in a yacht sesignded by her father, derermind to find his long los sister in england. Can her family LOve stretch across time and the vastness of the oceans? And will threads of Arthurs life finally come together

hope you read this book

Answer 8

The first author that comes to mind when I think of funny or comedic classics is Mark Twain.

Others include:

Don Quixote (Cervantes)
Cannery Row (Steinbeck)
Gulliver's Travels (Swift)
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (Lewis)
St. Ives: Being the Adventures of a French Prisoner in England (Stevenson)
Shakespeare's comedies
Catch 22 (Heller)

Answer 9

a particular Slant of light - Laura Whitcomb A Kiss In Time, Beastly, Cloaked - Alex Finn Anna wearing Blood - Blake Blood and Chocolate - Annette Klause service of the Mark - Fallon darkish Lover – Ward Falling below - Gwen Hayes Grave Mercy - LaFevers Haven - Kristi cook dinner Sea Witch - Kantra Sookie Stackhouse series - Charlaine Harris Vampire Academy – Mead

Answer 10

Tom Sawyer, The Adventures of Huck Finn