Woody Allen! I haven’t read him in years but, the three books I have read (Without Feathers, Side Effects and Getting Even) were so outlandishly hilarious that I re-read them at least 3 times.
Tom Holt is pretty good, kind of a Douglas Adams type of thing (but not quite as Douglas Adamy as Douglas Adams).
Expecting Someone Taller is a good one to get the feel for his style.
Nerdy little English guy hits a badger that turns out to be the last of the frost giants (in disguise).
I loved the review from that page
The Zombie Survival Guide by Max Brooks (Mel’s son)
and another enthusiastic vote for Patrick McManus.
Robert Rankin…especialy the Brentford Trilogy series (though they are hard to find in the US)
Another vote for the Bob Grant/Doug Naylor Red Dwarf books. I was very entertained by them.
I’d also like to nominate Robert Asprin’s Phule’s Company and M.Y.T.H. series. The former is sci-fi, the other fantasy, but both are quite amusing.
yes, yes, yes! so funny.
Steve Martin, the actor’s, books are good, too. Cruel Shoes has some great stuff in it, and The Pleasure of My Company, though a little dry for some, is one of my all-time favorite reads.
To Say Nothing of the Dog by Connie Willis. Time travellers of the near future return to Victorian England, the Middle Ages & Coventry during the Blitz–in search of a Victoran object.
Mystery, romance, history & wit. With a special emphasis on loopy Victoriana.
Willis wrote Doomsday Book, using the same Time Lab. But the time of the Black Death was not nearly as amusing.
Another vote for Tom Robbins. Even his worst stuff is mighty fine.
I’ll chime in with a third vote for Patrick McManus. I don’t think he gets the recognition he deserves.
Sir Apropos of Nothing by Peter David is good, the sequels less so.
I had another one in mind, but it’s escaped me now, as it took five minutes to load this page.
The Phoenix Guards, by Steven Brust, is a fantasy adventure written in a style that simultaneously mocks and pays homage to Alexander Dumas’s The Three Musketeers. It made me laugh a lot.
The Liar, by Stephen Fry, was also pretty funny, especially if you like pornographic gay humor set in a British boarding school.
Daniel
Another good amusement from Willis is Bellwether. Mystery, romance, fads & wit. And sheep.
You also might like Gideon Defoe’s “The Pirates!” novels…two of them are out now (“The Pirates! In an Adventure with Scientists” and “The Pirates! in an Adventure with Ahab”), and one’s due out in October (“The Pirates! In an Adventure with Communists”) The books have everything…pirates, adventure, scientists (or Ahab), ham. Really worth a read.
Fanny Flag
Try Hugh Cook’s The Wordsmiths and the Warguild, a great parody of fantasy novels. It’s actually book two in a ten-book series, but most of the other volumes aren’t as good. This one is laugh-out-loud hilarious from start to finish.
A fourth vote for Patrick McManus. I have a large collection of humor books, his are the only ones that have made me chuckle days after reading one of his stories.
I liked Waiting for the Galactic Bus by Parke Godwin a lot. And I love Lewis Grizzard.
I absolutely hated To Say Nothing of the Dog by Connie Willis, but Three Men In A Boat (to say nothing of the dog) by Jerome K. Jerome is one of the funniest books I’ve ever read.
All Roth books are funny, to varying degrees, which makes even the crappy ones enjoyable. I have to recommend the Zuckerman Trilogy and The Counterlife.
T.C. Boyle is also very funny, though not as much as he used to be, and he does have an annoying penchant for Dickensian pathos. Try The Descent of Man, Budding Prospects or The Road To Wellville.