Comedy Humor World

Demonstrating once again why he is one of Canada's most loved jokesters, Black masterfully captures the laughter that often bursts out of the seams of everyday life. From an unexpected drag race to a Google search for a picture of the illusive "Arthur the Meek", you just never know when a regular day is going to turn into comedic genius. Black provides uproarious insight into uses a matador might have for a teacup, mango, or simply some paper towel....

When Nancy discovers that the expensive jewelry her husband's been buying isn't for her, she decamps from the Scottish countryside to her best friend Carmen's posh Chelsea town house to sort things out. Nancy finds herself in a surprising new world, where rock stars are nicer than you thought, social workers are not necessarily to be trusted, and the filthy rich are folks with problems just like you.

Meet Rebecca Bloomwood. She's a financial journalist who spends all day writing articles on how to manage money wisely. Her own method of managing money is to hide her Visa bills under the bed and hope they'll disappear. Becky just can't stop shopping. She knows she has to do something: either Cut Back or Make More Money. Except Cutting Back seems impossible, and her attempts to Make More Money just get her into trouble. Her bank manager is sending her sterner and sterner letters, her credit cards are being declined, her Mum and Dad have no idea… what is she going to do?

When Rachel Meyer, a 30-something foodie from New York, agrees to move to Mumbai with her Indian-born husband, Dhruv, she knows some culture shock is inevitable. Blessed with a curious mind and an independent spirit, Rachel is determined to learn her way around the hot, noisy, seemingly infinite metropolis she now calls home. But the expat American’s sense of adventure is sorely tested when her mother-in-law, Swati, suddenly arrives from Kolkata - 1,000 miles away - alone, with an even more shocking announcement: She’s left her husband of more than 40 years and moving in with them.

When the greatest female mathematician in history passes away, her son, Alexander "Sasha" Karnokovitch, just wants to mourn his mother in peace. But rumor has it the notoriously eccentric Polish émigré has solved one of the most difficult problems in all of mathematics and has spitefully taken the solution to her grave. A ragtag group of mathematicians from around the world descends upon Rachela's shiva, determined to find the proof or solve it for themselves - even if it means prying up the floorboards for notes.

In a little dive in a small Israeli city, Dov Greenstein, a comedian a bit past his prime, is doing a night of stand-up. In the audience is a district court justice, Avishai Lazar, whom Dov knew as a boy, along with a few others who remember Dov as the awkward, scrawny kid who walked on his hands to confound the neighborhood bullies. Gradually, teetering between hilarity and hysteria, Dov's patter becomes a kind of memoir, taking us back into the terrors of his childhood.

Once upon a time, Melanie Layton and Tennyson O'Rourke were inseparable - but their friends-4ever promises were shattered when an explosive secret was revealed at Mel's wedding, a secret that destroyed her family. The two haven't spoken for the past twenty-some-odd years, and they'd be happy if they never crossed paths again.

A tour de force of black humor and imaginary erudition, Nazi Literature in the Americas presents itself as a biographical dictionary of writers who espoused extreme right-wing ideologies in the 20th and 21st centuries.

Daphne Maritch doesn't quite know what to make of the heavily annotated high school yearbook she inherits from her mother, who held this relic dear. Too dear. The late June Winter Maritch was the teacher to whom the class of '68 had dedicated its yearbook, and in turn she went on to attend every reunion, scribbling notes and observations after each one - not always charitably - and noting who overstepped boundaries of many kinds. In a fit of decluttering (the yearbook did not, Daphne concluded, "spark joy"), she discards it when she moves to a small New York City apartment.

After fleeing crumbling, volatile Venezuela, Yola Palacio wants nothing more than to settle into a peaceful new life in Trinidad with her family. And who cares if they’re there illegally - aren’t most of the people on the island? But life for the Palacios is far from quiet - and when Yola’s aunt Celia dies, the family once again find their lives turned upside down. For Celia had been keeping a very big secret - she owed a lot of money to a local criminal called Ugly. And without the funds to pay him off, Ugly has the entire family do his bidding until Celia’s debt is settled.

Lucas and Margo are fed up. Margo is a brilliant programmer tired of being talked over as the company’s sole black employee, and while Lucas is one of many Asians at the firm, he’s nearly invisible as a low-paid customer service rep. Together, they decide to steal their tech startup’s user database in an attempt at revenge. The heist takes a sudden turn when Margo dies in a car accident, and Lucas is left reeling, wondering what to do with their secret—and wondering whether her death really was an accident.

Alex-Li Tandem sells autographs. A small blip in a huge worldwide network of desire, his business is to hunt for names on paper, collect them, sell them, and occasionally fake them - all to give the people what they want: a little piece of Fame. But what does Alex want? Only the return of his father, the reinstatement of some kind of all-powerful, benevolent God-type figure, the end of religion, something for his headache, three different girls, infinite grace, and the rare autograph of '40s movie actress Kitty Alexander. With fries.

let me tell you about Ivan—the world's absolute worst best dog ever. Honestly, I blame myself for this one. I made the colossal mistake of watching Marley & Me with him when he was a puppy. Big mistake. Huge. He must've seen Marley as his life coach or spiritual guide because, wow, Ivan isn't just following in Marley's paw prints—he's sprinting past them while setting the house on fire.

Another light-hearted adventure in the Souleater Witches series. When Angela, cousin of the Souleater witches, daughter of an angel and sworn enemy of the Welsh Coven touches an old painting in the basement of an English country house she finds herself being transferred to an imaginary world created by a young girl, Gertrude the Empress, where the Souleater’s nemesis, a witchfinder called Jeremiah Pole attempts to have her burnt at the stake. Angela’s witch cousins, plus their boyfriend Edgar travel to rescue her, meeting magical fairies, trolls, King Arthur, Lancelot and the other ...

Heroic bookseller Laurent Letellier comes across an abandoned handbag on a Parisian street. There's nothing in the bag to indicate who it belongs to, although there's all sorts of other things in it. Laurent feels a strong impulse to find the owner and tries to puzzle together who she might be from the contents of the bag. Especially a red notebook with her jottings, which really makes him want to meet her. Without even a name to go on, and only a few of her possessions to help him, how is he to find one woman in a city of millions?

Otter Lake is a sleepy Anishnawbe community where little happens. Until the day a handsome stranger pulls up astride a 1953 Indian Chief motorcycle - and turns Otter Lake completely upside down. Maggie, the Reserve’s chief, is swept off her feet, but Virgil, her teenage son, is less than enchanted. Suspicious of the stranger’s intentions, he teams up with his uncle, Wayne - a master of aboriginal martial arts - to drive the stranger from the Reserve. And it turns out that the raccoons are willing to lend a hand.

As a teen Maddy Harvey was a bit of an ugly duckling. Luckily she's blossomed since then, and Maddy thanks God for this small miracle when a tall, handsome stranger comes to her rescue one starry summer's night. But instant attraction turns to a disaster in the making when Maddy learns the identity of her superman: Kerr McKinnon. Of all the colorful residents of the small Cotswold town of Ashcombe, why did it have to be him? Because, as family feuds go, the Montagues and the Capulets have nothing on the Harveys and the McKinnons.

The first installment in Giles Milton's outrageously entertaining series, History's Unknown Chapters: colorful and accessible, intelligent and illuminating, Milton shows his customary historical flair as he delves into the little-known stories from the past. There's the cook aboard the Titanic, who pickled himself with whiskey and survived in the icy seas where most everyone else died. There's the man who survived the atomic bomb in both Hiroshima and Nagasaki. And there's many, many more.

In a country where patriarchal favoritism and the primacy of sons survived multiple revolutions and an ideological earthquake, this epic novel is first and foremost about women, with the female body serving as the book’s central metaphor. The protagonist, Mother, is born in 1900 and married at seventeen into the Shangguan family. She has nine children, only one of whom is a boy—the narrator of the book. A spoiled and ineffectual child, he stands in stark contrast to his eight strong and forceful female siblings.

Claire Sommers grew up as a society girl destined to have it all: tasteful Dallas mansion, high-powered career, hot and rich husband. Until a massive mistake left her reputation in tatters and trust fund frozen. Now the former debutante is scraping by as a magazine staffer in Nashville—trading in her diamonds and designer stilettos for rhinestones and cowgirl boots. But all is not well in the world of print publications.