DW knows all

[oyceter]

Lately the only thing I seem to be able to read is romantic comedy. So... rec me stuff!

I have just gone on a terrible binge through nearly all of Julia Quinn (rilina, this is all your fault!), whom I have been enjoying because her heroes tend to be less alpha, her couples genuinely seem to like each other, and she's funny. Also, it helps that her later books have been overcoming her tendency to put 100 pages too much at the end.

I am mostly looking for something rather like 1930s romantic comedies, with a lot of banter and extremely likable heroines. Non-alpha heroes are a HUGE plus. It doesn't have to be in the romance genre, although I only want recs for textual things; my brain just cannot concentrate on TV or movies lately. Sadly, this goes for manga too and basically anything visual.

I also enjoy Loretta Chase, Laura Kinsale's comedies, Connie Brockway's comedies, and Jennifer Crusie.

I have kind of bounced off Eloisa James (is she considered funny?). I don't read as many contemporaries because a lot of the romance genre rules work better for me in historicals, but if it is screwball and feminist, I am all for it. I tend to bounce off of adult chick lit because I frequently don't actually find it funny or enjoyable.

... Maybe I should finally start reading Heyer?

Comments

[rachelmanija]

Yeah, I would try Heyer. Sprig Muslin is the one which got me started. It's quite funny. (Extremely silly young couple runs off together; sensible older couple is caught in the crossfire.)

I also think you would enjoy Sylvester (heroine is snubbed by man with evil eyebrows and writes a Gothic in which a man who looks just like him is a villain; they meet and fall in love; the book comes out), Cotillion (my all-time favorite of her non-alpha heroes... Now that I think of it, most of her heroes are non-alpha), and Frederica (can't recall the plot, if any, only that it made me laugh and there's a hot air balloon, kids, and dogs.)

Two warnings:

The language may take some getting used to. I remember someone on LJ parodying it as, "Do you take me for a puff-antler, sir? What spiffery! What a squizzle!"

The Grand Sophy has an incredibly anti-Semitic scene. Either avoid entirely, or when Sophy goes to the pawn shop, skip ahead till she's out of the pawn shop.

[oyceter]

Haha, possibly I was saving Heyer just for a time like this.

[estara]

Dont't forget Venetia! With the heroine really running rings about the rake who actually doesn't act alpha at all with her and is really sorry he ever was a rake and she has to convince him with desperate measure that she'll have herself debauched anyway, if he doesn't do it. I also love the sidecharacters, especially her younger and older brothers.

[rilina]

I have no helpful suggestions beyond second rachelmanija's Heyer recs. I own Frederica, if you want to borrow.

Oh, wait! Have you read Janet Mullany? I enjoyed The Rules of Gentility a lot and would read her other work in a heartbeat if I could easily get my hands on it. I don't love her characters, but her writing is witty and makes me laugh and laugh.

[oyceter]

Oh! I have Rules of Gentility, only in Taiwan, but I should look for it in the library! I remember passing it by because of the Bridget Jones comparison.

Btw, which was the Heyer you mentioned being good to save? I vaguely remember it as Cotillion, which I found in a used bookstore, but wasn't sure.

[graygirl]

Have you read Kinsale's newest, Lessons in French? :) Also, I would have rec'd Quinn, but you seem to have read her!

[oyceter]

Hee, pre-ordered it so I could have it in my greedy hands the second it came out! It is super cute!

[meganbmoore]

I read a Heyer last week, Lady of Quality, that had a strong 30s comedy feel (and, cvonveniently, is the first of the 4 Heyers I''ve read that i really really loved).

If you can find them, I'm very fond of Loretta Chase and Susan Carroll's older Trad. Regencies, but you may not be able to find them even in used bookstores anymore, and I think you already read Carla Kelly. They're reprinting Jo Beverley's, though, and I've liked those that I've read, and they're lighter than her historicals.

I've always been fond of Amanda Quick, but she really does kind of rewrite the same thing over and over. I like Sabrina Jeffries and Suzanne Enoch's earlier books, but both wore off for me about 6~ books into their careers, though I think I also had a general burnout on romances for a couple years around the same time. The couple of Jacquie D'Alessandro's I've read have been pretty fun, ditto for Liz Carlyle and Kathryn Caskie. Also, while not RomComs, and possibly out of print, I'm absurdly fond of Marsha Canham's swashbuckler romances, especially Swept Away and Pale Moon Rider.

[oyceter]

I've pretty much read through all of Chase's backlist (there are one or two I've been saving), and while I like what I've read of Kelly, they're not frothy enough for my mood right now. Maybe I will try Beverley's Regencies... I bounce hard off her historicals for some reason.

I've bounced off Quick and Enoch and Carlyle, but will check out the others, thanks!

[dhobikikutti]

You should read E. Lockhart's Fly On the Wall, and also probably Disreputable History of Frankie Landeu-Banks. They're light and funny enough to be entertaining, you will find the politics overall palatable, and there isn't much angst. Also, YA, so short.

[oyceter]

Okay! Do they have a big romance component? The brain, it is going to sheer fluff.

[shewhohashope]

Don't read Venetia! It has this one horribly sexist bit which made me stop reading, and then I read Black Sheep which had this guy who worked for the East India Company and suddenly I can't read Heyer or any Regency novels for at least a while because of all the horrible, horrible associations I can no longer skip over.

ETA: I can never not recommend Cotillion. And I'm a fan of The Convenient Marriage, but I think a lot of people hate it. There are lots of issues with Sophy, but that one horrifically anti-semitic scene is the absolute worst.

[coffeeandink]

I am also really fond of The Convenient Marriage! Venetia and The Black Sheep also had more alpha type heroes so they are not in my top tier.

[oyceter]

Ahaha, I am kind of doing the fingers in ears "LALALA I CAN'T HEAR YOU" every time the romances I read mention the East India Company or India or China or... anything. Right now am managing to ignore references as long as it's not central to the plot, or even skip over bits that are just for brain candy, but some day I will have a giant rant on the assumptions Regencies are based on.

[lnhammer]

Heyer!

[coffeeandink]

So, random non-romance stuff that fits the bill for me when I am in the screwball comedy kind of mood, but which may not work for you:

* Demon's Covenant! I found an early copy and am very excited about starting it as soon as I've finished the current book. Also, there is a new Diana Wynne Jones. I haven't loved DWJ's most recent stuff as much as her earlier stuff, but she is still in my literary pantheon

* Joan Aiken, especially stuff like the early Wolves Chronicles and The Serial Garden collection ("Monday was the day on which unusual things were allowed, and even expected to happen at the Armitage house.")

* Sarah Caudwell ("Scholarship asks, thank God, no recompense but Truth. It is not for the sake of material reward that she (Scholarship) pursues her (Truth) through the undergrowth of ignorance, shining on Obscurity the bright torch of Reason and clearing aside the tangled thorns of Error with the keen secateurs of Intellect. Nor is it for the sake of public glory and the applause of the multitude: the scholar is indifferent to vulgar acclaim. Nor is it even in the hope that those few intimate friends who have observed first hand the labour of the chase will mark with a rod or two of discerning congratulation its eventual achievement. Which is very fortunate, because they don't.")

* Helen Cresswell, Bagthorpes books ("The whole thing started when Uncle Parker won a cruise in the Caribbean for two after filling in a leaflet he had idly picked up in the village shop. The minute the news was known in the Bagthorpe househould disbelief, annoyance and downright jealousy began to degenerate into what became, inevitably, an All Out Furore.")

* Jane Emerson, City of Diamond - Epic space opera with witty dialogue, alas ends on cliffhanger that seems unlikely to be resolved

* Eleanor Farjeon, The Little Bookroom or The Glass Slipper

* P.C. Hodgell ("Apprehensively [Jame] recited the charm. It usually took Cleppetty half an hour to ready her bread for the oven; Jame's rose in five minutes. When the widow sliced into the baked loaf, however, they discovered that its sudden expansion had been due to the growth of rudimentary internal organs.

("That was the end of Jame's apprenticeship in the kitchen.") Also, there is significant knitting and embroidery in later books!

Naomi Mitchison, Travel Light (a fairy tale about a princess who becomes a Valkyrie) or, if you can find it, To the Chapel Perilous (minor figures from Arthurian legend are local newspaper reporters trying to chase the stories of the Grail legend through conflicting observers)

* Alis A. Rasmussen, The Labyrinth Gate - a young married couple from our world cross over into an alternate Regency where magic is accepted and bold young women can become rakes. Early Regency fantasy, much neglected. Author now writes as Kate Elliott.



Stuff I think you've probably already read, but I can't remember for sure:

* Susanna Clarke
* Pamela Dean
* Hope Mirlees
* Elizabeth Marie Pope
* Patricia Wrede & Caroline Stevermer, Sorcery and Cecelia

[kate_nepveu]

Sarah Caudwell Sarah Caudwell Sarah Caudwell!

Will come back later with more, maybe.

[(Anonymous)]

I've begun to read some Heyer and have liked it. I heartily recommend These Old Shades, and, though it may be a little low on banter, I still think it will suit your requirements. :)

- swanjun

[oyceter]

Awesome, thank you!

The good thing about finally starting Heyer is that I have a ton of backlist!

[shana]

Not romance, but light and amusing: Kerry Greenwood's Phryne Fisher mysteries. Set in Australia in 1928. When I discovered them, only six were in print in this country so I had to order the rest from Australia, but the US publisher is now caught up.

I do have to wave my hands at the continuity errors between the books (like 1928 seems to have had a few months added into the middle of it) and just what title did her father inherit... But each individual book is consistent.

You should be able to get them at the public library. Cocaine Blues is the first one, but the one that I picked up first that hooked me was Ruddy Gore.

[jinian.livejournal.com]

These eventually got to be too Mary-Sue and inconsistent for me, but I did enjoy the earlier ones a lot. She sleeps around and is ridiculously awesome! Fun!

[troisroyaumes]

Fourthing (or fifthing?) Cotillion, which is my favorite Heyer ever!

Alas, I haven't read much romance otherwise, but I like to read P.G. Wodehouse when I'm in the mood for humor.

[oyceter]

Awesome, thanks!

[kate_nepveu]

Heyer: _Cotillion_, _The Unknown Ajax_, _Frederica_ (with the same caveat as Rachel).

Not romance, but: Donald Westlake's Dortmunder series; you could start with any but _Drowned Hopes_ or _The Road to Ruin_. Comic capers, low-key absurdity with perfect craft. http://www.steelypips.org/weblog/books/mystery/dortmunder/ Whenever I don't know what to read, the answer is often Pratchett or Westlake.

[oracne]

Have you read Greg Frost's new Cthulu story, which is a Westlake homage? It's in CTHULHU'S REIGN.

[rushthatspeaks]

Sarah Caudwell! coffeeandink is totally, totally right.

Also, Heyer. I'm pretty sure The Convenient Marriage is the one that has the scene that always makes me laugh so hard I hurt myself.

Also, in the memoir area, a soothing, gentle, surprisingly funny, and amazingly-I-do-not-want-to-kill-everything-as-much-as-I'd-feared treasure is Gwen Raverat's Period Piece. She was Charles Darwin's granddaughter and the book is about her late Victorian childhood. She was a professional illustrator and her drawings are charming; also the only contemporary writer I've seen admit outright that everyone's clothes were hot, annoying, constricting and terrible. Her rant on the subject of God As Gentlemen See Him makes me very happy.

[oyceter]

Thanks! May skip on the recs for now because I am not sure my brain can actually handle a mystery. Unless Caudwell is readable even if you cannot keep track of plot? Will def. keep the memoir in mind too, thanks.

[(Anonymous)]

A word of warning with Heyer; definitely stick with the regency and pre-regency romances.

Her mysteries sometimes have good characters and possible romance subplots, but are weak. And her two attempts at gothic romances (Cousin Kate and The Reluctant Widow) both annoyed me (the latter more than the former). And anything that smacks of being a history book (MY Lord John, the Conqueror) is also an avoid. I've been warned off Simon the Coldheart for being scarily bad at homosexuality, and Penhallow for general awfulness.

I was warned that Lady of Quality is sub-par of Heyer's Regency and pre-regency romances, and found it much less entertaining a read than Venetia or the Grand Sophy, though it lacks the problematical issues of those two (I loved those two unstinting in spite of same - of course, I skimmed the pawn shop scene). Cotillion and Sprig Muslin seem to be universally agreed upon.

I can't really recommend you any new romances elsewhere; I'm actually taking down the names you listed and others' recommendations for my own purposes, as I'm nowhere near conversant with the genre, and would also like to read non-eyerolling things.

[(Anonymous)]

Oops; just to explain, I'm from LJ, where I post as Lenora_rose.

[estara]

You know there's excellent repartee and I mean excellent (with a vibe like Marguerite and Sir Percy of Scarlet Pimpernel fame) in Martha Wells' Death of the Necromancer, but it's only one of the threads. It's fantasy with romance and not a fantasy romance.

I also like the back in forth between the love interests in Sherwood Smith's The Trouble with Kings and Sasharia en Garde (book 1 and 2).

[oyceter]

I kind of bounced off of Wells' Element of Fire, but oooo, Scarlet Pimpernel reference! I may save it for later, though; I don't think my brain is up for any plot that is more than "girl meets boy. Happy ever after!"

Her Royal Spyness

[(Anonymous)]

Yay, I have Julia Quinn on my TBR mountain!

Not strictly in the romance genre, but you might want to try Rhys Bowen's Her Royal Spyness, a mystery set in the 1930s. The heroine is fun, and there's a sexy guy in it that I suspect she'll be ending up with in one of the later books - at the very least, I'm sure there will be lots and lots of fun tension between the two of them.

Re: Her Royal Spyness

[oyceter]

Oooo, thanks for the rec!

[oracne]

Here's a big Heyer rec post on my LJ from WAY back in 2004:

http://oracne.livejournal.com/428446.html

I couldn't get into Eloisa James, though after I bounced hard off the first one I tried, I gave her another chance years later.

Otherwise, coffeeandink is most wise.

[oyceter]

Thank you! Haha, I think I keep getting Heyer recs every year or so when I say this year will be the one I actually read her, but I never quite get around to it.

Yeah, I read three Eloisa James books in the past month and ... she still doesn't work for me. Although I did like her Georgians a bit more than the Regencies.