the ask@AAR: What’s the funniest romance you’ve ever read?
I’ve spent the past two weeks first moving and then unpacking and unpacking and unpacking. I have the bandwidth of a plinth and the patience of a nap-deprived toddler. I’d could us a good, easy laugh. What have you got? What’s the funniest romance you’ve ever read?
Completely agree with what others have said about Crusie.
A couple of my other favourites on the funny side of romance are Elizabeth Bevarly and Stephanie Bond.
Of late, IOU by Kristy Mar is the book that made me laugh out loud while reading. When I finished, I flipped back to the beginning and started again!
help question and apologies that it’s a bit off topic – I am looking to reread a historical which features a tall dark haired hero who was a villain in the prior book of a series. I believe he is an MP and in the start of the novel is working the heroine’s uncle on sinister doings. He leaves and is accosted and beaten badly and winds up with a severe brain injury and amnesia (of course). The heroine claims to be his fiancé and helps as he gets better. When he wakes, he is like a different person but we start to see why he is the way he is… his parents and brother treat him terribly. Anyways, I know this sounds similar to a few other novels but I am fairly certain it was a DIK and “fairly” recent. I thought it was Rose Lerner…it’s that type of style and no ton, etc. I have gone through my library twice and can’t find it!
I believe you are looking for A Lady’s Code of Misconduct by Meredith Duran.
You just totally made my whole COVID House bound weekend. Cheers! Also wanted to add that, for me, nothing beats the opening scene of Julie Ann Long’s “What I Did For a Duke” for humor.
That Long is funny. The secondary characters are vastly amusing–the woman who draws kittens! I think Long excels at humor and pathos.
Dabney is right about the Duran. I’m currently rereading it.
Neanderthal meets Human by Penny Reid is definitely one of my favorite rom-coms. Anything but Minor by Kate Stewart, Making Waves by Tawna Fenske, Pretty Face by Lucy Parker, One and Only by Jenny Holiday also come to mind as having made me laugh a lot.
My favorites are:
-The Black Umbrella by Mary Balogh
-The Hampshire Hoyden by Michelle Martin
-Act Like It by Lucy Parker
I love (and laugh at) anything by Jennifer Crusie but my favorite is “Anyone But You”. Her dialogue and snarky sarcasm just makes me laugh cry so many times- I will reread a particular passage when I need a pick me up. Plus no one does dog interactions any better.
I love Molly Harper books- on audio. Amanda Ronconi’s narration captures the author’s snarkiness in a way that just reading the books doesn’t for me. I have a special fondness for her Jane Jameson series and have had to pull over a few times because I was laughing so hard.
I had forgotten about those Harper books. I read the first two and really enjoyed them. I’ll have to go back and check them out again. Thanks.
I just discovered the Molly Harper books this spring/summer and read all of the Jane Jameson ones and her werewolf series. They’re very fun and a great mood lifter.
Jenny Cruise is always reliable.
One of my favorite funnies is Wallbanger by Alice Clayton. (2013)
I love the humour in Jennifer Crusie’s books – my go to when I want to be cheered up. Agnes and the Hitman, which she co wrote with Bob Mayer is also a great pick me up.
The funniest book I have read recently is First Comes Scandal by Julia Quinn. I was reading it in the early hours of the morning and trying not to laugh out loud and wake up my other half. The dialogue is wonderful.
Rachel Gibson has written several humorous romances. See Jane Score is my favorite.
I love early Rachel Gibson. She was routinely hilarious!
Flowers in the Storm by Laura Kinsale; which is a strange choice because it is also heart-wrenching.
I am generally not one to laugh out loud while reading, but “The Marriage Game” by Sara Desai had me laughing multiple times! It’s a great blend of snarky characters, humorous situations (the heroine is meeting a list of potential husbands compiled by her father and each one is more hilarious than the previous!) and family hijinx, together with very likable characters. Highly recommended!
Any Duchess Will Do or Do You Want to Start A Scandal both by Tessa Dare. Book four and five of the Spindle Cove series! Sooo good and funny!!
I don’t find many romances to be laugh out loud funny. But, off the top of my head, the funniest romances I’ve read thus far — and I’d love to read more — are:
The Vintage Guide to Love and Romance (2015) – Kirsty Greenwood
All I Ever Wanted (2010) – Kristan Higgins
Hustle Sweet Love (1988) – Maggie Davis
By the way, there were some funny moments in Emily Henry’s Beach Read, which is getting a lot of attention this summer, but it also has a lot of angsty moments. So, there’s some bitter with the sweet.
Hustle Sweet Love is an oldie but goodie. I also liked Can You Keep a Secret by Sophie Kinsella.
Jennifer Crusie is always hilarious. Beard Science (Penny Reid) was funny, though I haven’t found the non-Cletus books as humorous.I am struggling to think of funny historicals. I mean, Heyer was funny in The Grand Sophy. “I meant a particularly well-bred horse!” never failed to make me snort. I always thought of Barbara Metzger as the “funny” Regency writer. Oh, Julia Quinn’s early Bridgerton books had some very funny scenes.
You mentioned Penny Reid and I also liked her book Dating-ish.
Bet Me by Jennifer Crusie always makes me laugh no matter how many times I read it
Swordheart by T. Kingfisher is the funniest book I have ever read, although the romance in it doesn’t do much for me.
Yes wonderful book – nine goblins by same author is a short novella, no romance, oh so so funny!
I agree with several of the titles already mentioned – Bet Me, The Hating Game and Boyfriend Material are all great when it comes to humour.
I also thought A Beastly Kind of Early by Mia Vincy was hilarious – I distinctly remember laughing out loud multiple times while reading it. And I’ve Got Your Number by Sophie Kinsella too – great banter between the leads and general ridiculous hilarity without anything being too screwball or OTT
Anne Gracie’s The Perfect Rake. I love everything about Gideon. There’s also an old one by Susan Spencer Paul… The Heiress Bride. The Kingpin of Camelot (recommended by Ilona Andrews), has a lot of goofy scenes. Mimi Jean Pamfiloff also writes funny stuff (Tommaso is pretty funny, but my favorite is Sun God Seeks Surrogate, because the heroine wonders if the gods ever watched The Gods Must Be Crazy, my favorite comedy movie ever).
I vaguely remember laughing out loud at Lady X’s Cowboy by Zoe Archer. I need to re read it.
I’ve given extremely high marks to Sarah Title’s small town contemps. They’re all hilarious.
She lives near me and is lovely.
I just read The Rosie Result by Graeme Simsion, then went back and re-read The Rosie Project and the Rosie Effect (the first two books in the trilogy). Hilarious, touching, educational. The last book is actually my favorite. Are they romances, yes, sort of. I gave all three books to my husband and, even though he knows I have read all the books, he laughs and laughs and then has to read sections out loud to me, to share the pleasure. So, I dunno, they might work for your purposes…
First, I feel bad for having the unadorned Wendy name.
Second, I agree about the third book being a favorite. I really appreciated the parenting storyline and Don’s struggles to be a good parent to Hudson.
If you’d like a happy break between unpacking those boxes, I highly recommend the very short (45 pages!) and very funny story “Lord Lovedon’s Duel” by the always wonderful Loretta Chase. It’s usually found in anthologies.
I’ll look for it! Thanks!
I’m going to add the other Chicago Stars by SEP as well as the Blue Heron series by Kristan Higgins. There are plenty of laugh out loud pieces in all these books. Good luck in your new home!
The Blue Heron series IS often very very funny. And the “what’s on my husband’s phone” scene in If You Only Knew made me laugh until I cried.
I’d pick Julie James’ Just the Sexiest Man Alive. Just thinking about the mock courtroom scene makes me laugh all over again.
I have to say I’ve never read it because of the AAR review!
Needless to say, I liked it a lot more than the reviewer did!
Hmmmm….I think it’s the part of the review that mentions “no sex” rather than the review itself.
I have no idea what you’re talking about….
I think Chrisreader means it’s pretty well known that you like your romances to contain some sexy times.
I think that is exactly what Chrisreader means and I’m shocked, just shocked. Moi?
Clearly I’ve gotten the wrong idea of you somehow.
“smirks”
I think you are missing out Dabney! James is one of a handful of authors who just “write funny”. James, along with Loretta Chase, Jennifer Crusie, and SEP are my “go to” authors when I want to laugh.
I really like all of Julie James’ books. I’d recommend it to you Dabney, regardless of the review!
I loved that book and it is very amusing.
I second the recommendation for Julie James. My favorites are It Happened One Wedding and A Lot Like Love.
Okay, taking my own advice to try to come up with something that you may not have read, Dabney, I loved Take a Chance on Me: Susan Donovan and Heaven Sent by Morsi, but I don’t know how well they have weathered time. I did love Heaven, Texas by Susan Elizabeth Phillips, but again, I haven’t read it in years. Like most things in life, try it and see.
I like the humor in SEP’s earlier works. That said, Heaven, Texas is not one of my favorites although I love the secondary romance between the hero’s mom and the bad boy of her youth. For me, the funniest of her books is Natural Born Charmer. I still smile every time someone mentions Speed Racer.
Natural Born Charmer is one SEP I’ve never read. Maybe it’s time to check it out.
As someone who wishes that the sex in romances were a little more realistic – at least occasionally – I *loved* the Speed Racer scene.
The opening chapters of Natural Born Charmer are laugh-out-loud funny to me (the Beaver costume!, etc) and also portions of Match Me If You Can by SEP!!
I really love the SEP’s Chicago Stars series. Natural Born Charmer and Match Me If You Can are at the top of the list. SEP is also the Queen of the secondary romance, and NBC and MMIYC are no exceptions. The audio books, narrated by the late, great Anna Fields, are the very best.
Oh. I had completely forgotten about Bodie and Portia. I love them.
First, you have my total, deep, everlasting. horrified sympathy. Moving is one of life’s awful circumstances, and it has to be much worse now than in other times. I hope you are moving into a place you love and that will make your life easier.
I second “Bet Me.” It’s my go-to book, time and again, if I want to laugh. It especially speaks to those of us with weight “issues.” I also have reread Loretta Chase’s “Dukes Prefer Blondes.” Right now, I’m rereading “A Wicked Kind of Husband” which is lovely. But my bet is that you’ve read all the well-known and loved recent romances, so I challenge people to come up with some that are not the classics that romance readers all know. After all, people, this is Dabney Grinnan who needs help, not a newcomer!
I do love where we’ve moved to. And we hope it will be the last ever–this is our retirement place! And, speaking of retirement, I’m almost 60 and my memory is routinely crap. So, reminders of books I’ve loved but forgotten is great! I loved Dukes Prefer Blondes–the carriage scene!–and had completely forgotten about it.
Dukes Prefer Blondes – his “other self.” A riot.
Probably The Mad Miss Mathley by Michelle Martin (a traditional Regency), though there are several other possibilities. I have recorded humor ratings for the romances I read since shortly after I started reading them in the 1990s, and The Mad Miss Mathley was the book that made me decide I needed a 5-point scale instead of the 3-point scale I started with. I also reread it within a week of the first reading, something I don’t think I’ve done with any other book, and have read it 22 times.
Two other contenders for funniest that I’ve actually read more times are A Rake’s Reform by Cindy Holbrook (traditional Regency, 28 times) and Ravished by Amanda Quick (Regency historical, 25 times).
The full list of my humor ratings is at http://www.ccrsdodona.org/markmuse/reading/romwhumorlist.html, with the 5-star ratings as the first section.
I still love Ravished. I think it’s the best of Krentz/Quick. Perfect Partners is another of hers that I particularly enjoy that has some funny moments.
I would definitely say Bet Me by Jennifer Crusie. I had heard it built up over the years and couldn’t believe it was that good. I finally read it this year and I laughed out loud reading it several times. It’s just that good. The heroine is genuinely funny and sharp and her relationship with her two best friends is great. If there is anyone out there who hasn’t read it yet I cannot recommend it highly enough. It’s a classic for a reason.
Bet Me gets my vote as well. In fact, it was my favorite for over 10 years and is still in my top 10. I’ve reread it probably 10+ times. Crusie has other novels that have funny moments, including Crazy for You, Tell Me Lies, and the Temptation books. Every time I hear the phrase, “This one,” I think of Bet Me.
I’ve been trying not to reread it too soon and “wear it out”. I went on a Crusie binge after reading Bet Me and finally read Welcome To Temptation and a bunch of others. Bet Me is by far the funniest. Temptation has some funny moments for sure but it’s a mixed bag. I was glad the brother got his own sequel/ book but it wasn’t nearly as good as the first book.
I love Welcome to Temptation. It’s just so funny. I might pick it over Bet Me!
That’s interesting! To me Temptation came off more as a dramedy with some really funny moments between the hero and heroine (and the hero’s daughter who was just great) to lighten up some of the other stuff. Bet Me had a couple of darker parts but the people across the board had less “baggage” so I could take it as more of a solid comedy with some dramatic underpinnings. I’ve found you can’t say where a Crusie book is going to go until after you have read it. Crazy For You is a book that I think sells itself as one thing and ends up being something very different.
Most romances I have read wouldn’t be what I’d call “funny,” although there might be a sparkling line here or there. I tend to avoid romcoms, both books and movies, because with a few exceptions, I don’t find that kind of humor funny. Keep in mind, I’m someone whose sense of humor revolves around MST3K, South Park, Blazing Saddles, and the like- styles that don’t exactly mix well with romance.
But I will fudge this question a little bit and recommend, once again, James Kirkwood’s novel P.S. Your Cat is Dead for anyone in the mood for a fun, campy, proto-m/m romance romp that made me laugh a lot.
For those of you who haven’t read my gushing posts on the book before, the protagonist is Jimmy Zoole, a struggling actor and wannabe writer who is having the worst New Year’s Eve ever after losing two acting jobs, getting dumped by his girlfriend, and having his apartment burgled twice among other mishaps. He captures the burglar, Vito, who has come back a third time (ridiculous, I know), ties him to the kitchen table, and then tries to figure out what to do with him. Goofy plot, dark comedy, and improbable HEA- just the kind of silliness some of us might need right now. Fair warning: 1970s book, definitely not PC. CW: contains ethnic slurs and a pretty serious rape threat at one point. But it’s pretty ahead of its time for giving two male characters an HEA together.
Another MST3K fan! Yay!
I’ve tried a few rom-coms that seemed popular, but for some reason, they never have me laughing (I’m mildly amused at best), and the humorous tone seems to clash with the romance for me. Also, slapstick or absurdity really doesn’t work for me.
The weird part, though, is that I love funny moments in serious romance, such as banter or snark between the hero and heroine. Those make me laugh. Maybe it’s because in the non-rom-coms, I’m not expecting the humor, and so it’s a fun surprise when it happens?
“Another MST3K fan! Yay!” Yay! right back at ya, Marian. :) Not to brag, but I actually had the pleasure of seeing Joel and the bots live on stage when they were on tour. It was the most appreciative, howling live audience I ever had the privilege of being a part of.
I love funny moments in serious romance too! Maybe because well-written banter and snark don’t feel as forced as rom-coms, which have the pressure to be funny all the time. The only romcom movies that have ever had me rolling in the aisles were My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2 (a sequel I actually like better than the original) and Mambo Italiano (2003 m/m comedy, not the Dean Martin film!) But I think they worked for me because of the family dynamics/antics within ethnic minority groups rather than forcing comedic situations directly on the couple. It was the family craziness around them that made those two films work for me.
Slapstick and absurdity can work for me really well outside of romance. Like The Court Jester or your rec Weekend at Bernie’s. The problem with a lot of wacky films and books is they make the mistake of shoehorning in a romance that just feels out of place for all the over the top craziness.
That is an important distinction, which is why I call my list (linked earlier) “romances with humor”, not humorous romances or romantic comedies. There are quite a few on the list that have serious plots AND humor. Just to name one author, Krentz (aka Quick & Castle) writes what I consider to be mostly light romantic suspense, yet the majority of her books also include enough humor to recommend for readers looking for humor. (That does not extend to her oldest books under the James pseudonym, when she had not developed her current style.)
I thought Mistress by Amanda Quick had a lot of good humor.
Probably Sally Thorne’s The Hating Game. I can pick it up at any place and immediately start laughing at the hijinks between Lucy and Josh, especially in the first half of the novel. I’m due for a reread.
That book always cheers me up!
Annabelle Costa’s books are cute, clever and can be very, very funny. I rarely laugh out loud at what I am reading but her books often make me giggle. It’s too hard to pick just one.
Right now, the first one that springs to mind is Alexis Hall’s Boyfriend Material. I’ve read books that have made me smile, giggle and laugh, but I can’t think of another one that made me do it quite so much! Lily Morton’s particular brand of snarky humour works for me as well.
Couldn’t agree more, Caz! I laughed all the way through Boyfriend Material and Morton’s Deal Maker
One of the Mary Balogh regencies, maybe “Lady with a Black Umbrella”, don’t quite recall, many of them were very funny.
At least I thought so 15-16 years ago. Might have a different opinion today.
A few month ago I reread An Unlikely Duchess by Balogh. It still is one of the funniest books I’ve ever read.
I never think of Balogh as being funny. I wonder when she switched from frothy to angsty.
I agree. It’s in her dialogue!
I found Boyfriend Material by Alexis Hall funny all the way through. It is also very romantic with not a great deal of angst. His Glitterland is also very funny in parts but much darker.
I also like Lily Morton’s snarky humour. I started with Rule Breaker, the first of her Mixed Messages series, and read through all of her books, which I found addictive! I have read them a few times throughout the lockdown.
Ditto with Lucy Parker. I read The Austen Playbook then went back and read all her books.
All these authors write with a very ‘British’ style of humour though, so might not match everyone’s sense of humour.
I just reread The Austen Playbook and I swear that book gets better and better each time. It’s now officially my favorite Lucy Parker novel. I also just read something from Parker about plans to write a book for Gryff’s brother, and that is something I would love to read too.
Probably Getting Schooled by Emma Chase is the funniest for me. It’s also very romantic and sweet. Runners up are The Weight of it All and Mr Impossible.
I liked the humor in Tangled by Emma Chase.