A Confederacy of Dunces"

I keep on meaning to finish reading this. I love it, but I always seem to get distracted halfway. Tom Sharpe is excellent too, very funny.

"I'm also pretty fond of the "Red Dwarf" television series, and there are a couple of books based on the series but the author's name escapes me at the moment."

You beat me to it, Waylon. :)

The authors are actually a pair: Rob Grant and Doug Naylor, but they wrote under the author name Grant Naylor. This is the important book:

"Red Dwarf Omnibus":

www.amazon.co.uk/Red-Dwarf...0140174664

GET THIS BOOK!!!

It's damn near as funny as Adams' stuff, and I've read it nearly as many times. I still laugh my ass off every time I read it. It actually contains the first two Red Dwarf books: Infinity Welcomes Careful Drivers and Better Than Life. The couple of follow-up books (like The Last Human) aren't nearly as good -- the two men started having problems and eventually split up. They worked *much* better as partners than on their own. But still worth reading if you (like me) are a Red Dwarf fan.

But, seriously, if you're a Douglas Adams fan (and *especially* if you like Red Dwarf as well), get the damn book! It is an absolute MUST READ for anyone who appreciates the British sci-fi/comedy genre. I guarantee you will not be disappointed.

In fact, it's time for me to read that again as well. It's been far too long.

(Note to Red Dwarf fans: Some of the plot details are different in the books than the TV series. The books were written after the series had been out for a bit, and they decided to flesh out the details more for the books, which makes sense, and in some cases that involved tweaking them. I, personally, prefer the plot details in the books to the plot details in the series in those areas where they're different.)