As I said earlier, deciding that I want to figure out how to insert the teeniest bit of humor in my own writing, means I have an excuse to read funny things, and feel like I’m being productive. One of them is To Say Nothing of the Dog, by Connie Willis.
We begin with Ned Henry, searching the smoking ruins of Coventry Cathedral for the “bishop’s bird stump.” He’s a time-traveller from the future, and after a combination of misunderstandings and omitted explanations, he is sent further into the past for a little R & R, along with a minor mission. Which he promptly screws up.
We meet Professor Peddick, the dotty professor; Tossie, the rich air-head; her mother, Mrs. Mering, the overbearing busybody; Colonel Mesial Mering (What a great name!), the Japanese goldfish fanatic; among others. But the most important character is the cat, Princess Arjumand, not least because Ned has no idea how to deal with cats. His only defense against these wacky Victorians is his fellow time-traveler, Verity, a who first appears to him as a vision of loveliness (but that’s because Ned is seriously time-lagged. Or is it?)
The plot, not that it matters, is filled with time-travel conundrums, slippages and incongruities. The story ambles along in a mildly amusing way, slowly winding up to actually revealing the bishop’s bird stump. The last third was the funniest and the direst, from a hijacking of a séance to a chase through war and time.
The book is a homage to Three Men In A Boat: To Say Nothing of the Dog, which gives me the feeling I was to supposed to enjoy the other book as well. But I’m a cat person, so I’ll settle for Princess Arjamand.
Writing Every Day 
I think TSNOTD is one of the funniest SF novels ever, and it’s the only Best Novel Hugo in the last ten years that isn’t a world-smashing epic.
Connie Willis employs the same time-traveling future setting in Doomsday Book, but to overwhelmingly tragic effect.
On the other hand, Three Men in Boat might be the funniest book I’ve ever read – face-crampingly, no-more-than-five-pages-at-a-time-or-I’ll-choke-to-death funny.
Hi Scott!
I get the impression that most people think TSNOTD is hysterical. That’s okay, I’m used to holding the minority opinion. So if TMIAB is similar humor, I might find that too merely amusing.
It is hard to think of another funny SF book. Right now, all I can come up with is Bill the Galactlc Hero . War is way funnier than Victorians.