Comedy Genius

This has proven to be the most significant book ever written on stand-up comedy. It truly comes to life as an audiobook, especially with ‘before & after’ examples of punchlines. It explains groundbreaking methods and theories that give you the tools to fast-track your stand-up to the next level and will permanently change the way you look at writing and performing comedy.

A Vulture Best Comedy Book of 2025 A wildly entertaining book by one of the world’s most obsessed and informed fans of TV icon Johnny Carson, setting the record straight on Carson's legacy and shining light on the personality behind the legendary comedian and talk show host Over the course of...

FINALIST FOR THE PEN/JACQUELINE BOGRAD WELD AWARD FOR BIOGRAPHY FINALIST FOR THE MARFIELD PRIZE FEATURED ON CBS SUNDAY MORNING From longtime New York Times and Vanity Fair writer David Margolick comes the first definitive biography of Sid Caesar: founding father of television comedy...

As part of the legendary comedy team known as Nichols and May, May revolutionized sketch comedy before striking out on her own to make history as the third woman to be admitted into the Directors Guild of America when she wrote, directed, and starred in 1971’s A New Leaf. Throughout the 1970s and ‘80s, May was one of Hollywood’s top screenwriters and script doctors and one of the only women directing within the studio system. After a box-office bomb, May never directed a feature again, though she continued to write films.

He survived forty thousand years in ice. Modern life might finish the job. When thirteen-year-old Richard Gardner crashes his snowmobile into a glacier, he expects a broken bone—maybe a lecture from his parents. What he doesn’t expect is to discover a living Neanderthal frozen inside the ice. Defrosting Bruce turns out to be the easy part. Now Richard, his sarcastic sister, and their overwhelmed parents are stuck hiding a prehistoric houseguest who thinks automatic doors are predators, microwaves are weapons, and grocery stores are an endless buffet. As Bruce struggles to make sense of ...

From breakout stand-up comedian Iliza Shlesinger comes a subversively funny collection of essays and observations on a confident woman's approach to friendship, singlehood, and relationships. "Girl Logic" is Iliza's term for the way women obsess over details and situations that men don't necessarily even notice. She describes it as a characteristically female way of thinking that appears to be contradictory and circuitous but is actually a complicated and highly evolved way of looking at the world.

Overturn everything you knew about history’s greatest minds in this raucous and hilarious book, where it turns out there's a finer line between "genius" and "idiot" than we've previously known. “As Albert Einstein almost certainly never said, everyone is a genius – but if you judge a fish...

Boy Genius is a powerful identity satire, the picaresque odyssey of a child seeking to avenge the wrongs perpetrated on his parents. Park's genius, born into the turmoil of post-war Korea, is used as a puppet by the South Korean government - before being banished to America. From a remote New York city ghetto, the boy wages a clandestine guerilla war against all symbols of authority.

Mention the names Arthur Stanley Jefferson and Norvell Hardy to a cinema-adoring crowd and you’ll get countless reactions in return. A few may scratch their heads. Others may fumble with their ties and grin nervously. If you’re very unlucky, someone will start to cry. But mention the names Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy and those reactions will become associated with the characters they know and love. These were the names that made them famous and still conjure up images today. Laurel & Hardy. Popular but not populist. They appealed to the masses; and the masses have kept them in the ...

To his colleagues, Richard Feynman was not so much a genius as he was a full-blown magician: someone who “does things that nobody else could do and that seem completely unexpected.” The path he cleared for twentieth-century physics led from the making of the atomic bomb to a Nobel...

Stefan Fatsis, a former Wall Street Journal reporter and National Public Radio regular, recounts his remarkable rise through the ranks of elite Scrabble players while exploring the game's strange, potent hold over them - and him. Scrabble might truly be called America's game. More than two million sets are sold every year and at least thirty million American homes have one.

The New York Times bestselling collection from FOX News star Greg Gutfeld features his best and pithiest monologues on the current state of the world, covering everything from pop culture to politics, annotated for the modern day with all new content. “Wherever I go, I am hit repeatedly by the...

Brielle Alder has spent her life hiding the truth. She is a 197-IQ prodigy capable of changing the world. To protect her twin sister, Demi, Brielle became the beautiful ghost in every room: underestimated, overlooked, and secretly building an AI powerful enough to disrupt the pharmaceutical industry. Then one reckless kiss changes everything. Damian Lindström has known Brielle since she was a kid. She is the off-limits little sister of his best friend. Now she is a brilliant, sharp-tongued woman with red lipstick, a dangerous smile, and a talent for destroying every rule he has ever lived ...

COLLEGE INSTALOVE LIKE YOU'VE NEVER SEEN . . . Her wit is sharper than my route-running on the football field. Her mind is quicker than my fastball on the baseball pitch. She wears mom-jeans and is on a mission to graduate early and save the world or some nonsense like that. Too serious. Too nerdy. Too not my type . . . Or so I thought. Drama and madness with a touch of angst. Sweetness and a hint of darkness. No cheating. No cliffhangers. And a guaranteed happy ending. This is campus-love, Annabelle Winters style. HERE'S WHAT READERS ARE SAYING ABOUT THE CURVY IN COLLEGE SERIES: ⭐️...

With three degrees and the highest measured IQ in the Motherlands, Shelly Summers knows that she's socially awkward. It doesn't bother her since as the head engineer for Advances Technologies she has little time for social interactions anyway. When she learns that one of the testers for the sex-bots her company manufactures is her old crush, Marco, she's curious to see if he'll recognize her now that she's 10 years older and no longer has bushy eyebrows and a bad case of acne. A normal person would have said something when Marco doesn't recognize her from his past.

“An ardent fan letter from Hornby that makes you want to re-read Great Expectations while listening to Sign o’ the Times.” —Vogue From the bestselling author of Just Like You, High Fidelity, and Fever Pitch, a short, warm, and entertaining book about art, creativity, and the unlikely...

Child genius Becky Bexley helps to organise a lot of fun at the university she studies at, including a humorous game in front of an audience for charity. She also turns out to have a talent for stand-up comedy, surprising perhaps, since she's only about eleven. Alcohol comes up for discussion one day as students talk about embarrassing things they did while drunk and the harmful effects of alcohol on the body, while Becky mostly listens in.

A tenant has disappeared in a New York slum, leaving behind strange, original artwork. Gallery owner Ethan Muller can see its brilliance—and money-making potential. When Ethan displays the art, the show attracts the attention of the police. Because the subjects of the pictures look exactly...

What would you do if you woke up one day to find that your best friend has become your worst enemy? That's exactly what happens to 11-year-old Ryan in this brand-new comedy adventure from bestselling author, comedian, and presenter Danny Wallace, perfect for readers age 8+ and fans of Stephen...

"Dancer in The Mirror" is a chilling horror novel that weaves the enigmatic persona of Michael Jenkins into a tale of terror & horror. In an alternate reality where Michael Jenkins never ascended to superstardom as the King of Pop, "Dancer in The Mirror" delves into the compelling life of a young man named Michael, who grows up in the heart of the urban neighborhood of East St Louis, far removed from the glitz and glamour of the music industry. "Dancer in The Mirror " unfolds in a world where unfounded fears and dark suspicions have cast Michael as a pariah, blamed for a series of ...