Holiday Gift Guide 2009: Funny? Funny!

I love to laugh -- it's getting worse every year. All the books I singled out that make you laugh would make great gifts, but here are five more I read this year that made me laugh.

Jeff Martin, MY DOG ATE MY NOBEL PRIZE. Martin spoofs fatuous memoirs (other memoir mentioned in this post not included in this body of work) by making a series of bigger and bigger claims, describing a life chronically undisturbed by failure. And reviewing it this summer gave me the opportunity to quote my favorite H.L. Mencken passage of all time.

Hadley Freeman, THE MEANING OF SUNGLASSES. I'm not positive that this is the funniest book about fashion ever, but since I haven't read any others that even attempt to be funny, I will go ahead and so garland it. The Guardian writer's perspective in this book, organized as an A to Z list of various sartorial topics, is that you can follow fashion and want to dress well while acknowledging the inherent ridiculousness of trends and rules; an Amazon reviewer described its audience as people who "are more concerned with the perfect sentence than the perfect shoe." Get a sense of her tone by reading her columns -- a recent one on cankles I thought was pretty witty.

Alison Lurie, FOREIGN AFFAIRS. I took this book on vacation not fully remembering why I sought it out, but I knew it was about a woman who goes on a trip and I figured if it wasn't good I could just take a nap. It turned out to be a satire of Americans abroad through the misadventures of two professors on sabbatical in London, stewing in their own prejudices, falling in love with the wrong people and not getting any work done. Virginia Miner, one of the professors, is one of those characters who is so painfully true to life you hate her, and then you hate to leave her.

Nathan Rabin, THE BIG REWIND. I am fully compromised on this pick via the AV Club connection, but this was one of my favorite memoirs of the year. It's incredibly painful at times, but also incredibly funny, where the humor acts as a sort of balm to the reliving of uncomfortable experiences. As suggested by the subtitle "A Memoir Brought To You By Pop Culture," you may also pick up a good movie or album recommendation here too.

Andy Zaltzman, DOES ANYTHING EAT BANKERS? AND 53 OTHER INDISPENSABLE QUESTIONS FOR THE CREDIT CRUNCHED. Okay, I'm asking for this one for Christmas, so I can't guarantee that it will be hilarious. But Zaltzman cohosts my favorite podcast of the moment and his topical British humor can't be beat. Since he never does stand-up in the U.S., this will have to suffice.

FTC cover-assery: I got a copy of MY DOG ATE MY NOBEL PRIZE from Soft Skull to review. I think I got FOREIGN AFFAIRS and THE MEANING OF SUNGLASSES on BookMooch. I bought THE BIG REWIND.

Graphic: LOLerature