Books like 'Roscoe'
Readers who enjoyed Roscoe by William Kennedy also liked the following books featuring the same tropes, story themes, relationship dynamics and character types.
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The Twelve Chairs by Ilya Ilf, Yevgeny Petrov
Rated: 4.41 of 5 stars · 27 ratingsOstap Bender is an unemployed con artist living by his wits in postrevolutionary Soviet Russia. He joins forces with Ippolit Matveyevich Vorobyaninov, a former nobleman who has returned to his hometown to find a cache of missing jewels which were hidden in some chairs that have been appropriated by the Soviet authorities...Categorized as:
classics crime historical-fiction humor literary-fiction satire 20th-century action-adventure -
The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov
Rated: 4.28 of 5 stars · 73 ratingsMoscow, 1929: a city that has lost its way amid corruption and fear, inhabited by people who have abandoned their morals and forsaken spirituality. But when a mysterious stranger arrives in town with a bizarre entourage that includes a giant talking cat and a fanged assassin, all hell breaks loose...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction humor literary-fiction politics satire 20th-century action-adventure -
Life With Jeeves by P.G. Wodehouse
Rated: 4.38 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsIt is old Bertie Wooster's habit to land in the soup from time to time. To get into a spot of bother. Circumstances, aided and abetted by Aunt Agatha, Aunt Dahlia, Bingo Little, Tuppy, Sippy and others, seem to conspire against him, and a frightful muddle ensues.Enter Jeeves, the source of all solace. Jeeves of the infinite sagacity...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction humor literary-fiction 20th-century adult anthologies comedy -
Flashman in the Great Game by George MacDonald Fraser
Rated: 4.35 of 5 stars · 29 ratingsOne of literature's most delightful rakes is back in another tale of rollicking adventure and tantalizing seduction. The plucky Flashman's latest escapades are sure to entertain devotees as well as attract new aficionados...Categorized as:
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Storing Up Trouble (American Heiresses (3)) by Jen Turano
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsWhen Miss Beatrix Waterbury's Chicago-bound train ride is interrupted by a heist, Mr. Norman Nesbit, a man of science who believes his research was the target of the heist, comes to her aid. Despite the fact that they immediately butt heads, they join forces to make a quick escape... -
Uncle Dynamite by P.G. Wodehouse
Rated: 4.29 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsFrom boyhood his has been a gay and happy disposition, and in the autumn of his life he still retains the fresh, unspoiled mental outlook of a slightly inebriated undergraduate.A keen matchmaker and intrepid impersonator, Lord Ickenham is in his element when at large on a sweetness-and-light-spreading excursion... -
The Great Brain Reforms by John D. Fitzgerald, Mercer Mayer
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsThe year is 1898, and the best con man in Adenville, Utah, is the infamous twelve-year-old Tom Fitzgerald, "The Great Brain." A year at the Catholic Academy for Boys certainly hasn't dulled Tom's love for money—he's no sooner off the train than he begins scamming his own brother! By the end of his summer break, Tom has tricked all of his friends out of everything they own...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction humor action-adventure book children children-books comedy -
The Return of the Great Brain by John D. Fitzgerald, Mercer Mayer
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsTom Fitzgerald, alias The Great Brain, is back, struggling to stay reformed now that his friends have threatened to ostracize him if he pulls even one more swindle. But his brother J.D. knows Tom's reformation is too good to be true, and as a reformed Great Brain makes for a dull life, J.D...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction humor action-adventure book children children-books comedy -
Sweeney Todd, the Demon Barber of Fleet Street by Stephen Sondheim, Hugh Wheeler
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsBook by Hugh Wheeler Introduction by Christopher... -
Meeting Her Match by Jen Turano
Rated: 4.30 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsMiss Camilla Pierpont, a renowned matchmaker and influential member of the New York Four Hundred, has vowed never to marry after suffering a devastating heartbreak during her debut years ago. However, when she is nearly abducted along the Hudson River, she finds herself rescued by an annoyingly outspoken, albeit fascinating, gentleman who challenges her in a manner she wasn't expecting... -
The Great Brain Is Back by John D. Fitzgerald
Rated: 4.21 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsThis classic trickster is back again, and he's up to no good in his eighth and final book of the series. Great mix of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and The Terrible Two series, and is perfect for fans of Roald Dahl.Tom D. Fitzgerald--better known as The Great Brain--has turned thirteen, and pretty Polly Reagan has put a spell on him. But when it comes to swindling his younger brother J. D...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction humor action-adventure book children children-books comedy -
The Overcoat and Other Short Stories by Nikolai Gogol
Rated: 4.21 of 5 stars · 36 ratingsFour works by great 19th-century Russian author - "The Nose," a savage satire of Russia's incompetent bureaucrats; "Old-Fashioned Farmers," a pleasant depiction of an elderly couple living in rustic seclusion; "The Tale of How Ivan Ivanovich Quarrelled with Ivan Nikiforovich," one of Gogol's most famous comic stories; and "The Overcoat," widely considered a masterpiece of form...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction humor literary-fiction satire adult anthologies audiobook -
Manalive by G.K. Chesterton
Rated: 4.19 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsPerhaps the most light-hearted of all Chesterton's "serious" works, Manalive pits a group of disillusioned young people against Mr. Innocent Smith, a bubbly, high-spirited gentleman who literally falls into their midst. Later accused of murder and denounced for philandering everywhere he goes, Smith prompts his newfound acquaintances to recognize an important idea in most unexpected ways...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction humor literary-fiction 20th-century action-adventure adult audiobook -
Me and My Little Brain by John D. Fitzgerald
Rated: 4.19 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsTom, a.k.a. the Great Brain, is off to boarding school. Now his little brother, J. D., is free to follow in Tom's ingenious, conniving, and profitable footsteps. All of J. D.'s attempts at turning a profit fail miserably, and he soon realizes that he just doesn't have that crafty Great Brain knack. But when his younger brother is kidnapped, J. D...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction humor action-adventure book children children-books comedy -
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The Pushcart War by Jean Merrill
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsThe pushcarts have declared war! New York City's streets are clogged with huge, rude trucks that park where they want, hold up traffic, and bulldoze into anything that is in their way, and the pushcart peddlers are determined to get rid of them. But the trucks are just as determined to get rid of the pushcarts, and chaos results in the city...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction humor politics satire 20th-century action-adventure alternate-history -
Much Obliged, Jeeves by P.G. Wodehouse
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsA Bertie and Jeeves classic, featuring the Junior Ganymede, a Market Snodsbury election, and the Observer crossword puzzle.Jeeves, who has saved Bertie Wooster so often in the past, may finally prove to be the unwitting cause of this young master's undoing in Jeeves and the Tie that Binds... -
Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit by P.G. Wodehouse
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsWhen Bertie Wooster goes to stay with his Aunt Dahlia at Brinkley Court and finds himself engaged to the imperious Lady Florence Craye, disaster threatens from all sides...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction humor literary-fiction 20th-century adult audiobook book -
Fish Preferred by P.G. Wodehouse
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsHugh Carmody loved Millicent, Lord Emsworth niece, but he was very good friends with Sue Brown - an attachment which Millicent, perhaps, could hardly be expected to enthuse over. Ronnie Fish loved Sue, and entertained feelings o unrestrained ferocity towards Pilbeam, a blister of the first water, who was pestering her with flowers...Categorized as:
classics crime historical-fiction humor literary-fiction 20th-century action-adventure adult -
Arsenic and Old Lace by Joseph Kesselring
Rated: 4.12 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsThe play is a farcical black comedy revolving around Mortimer Brewster, author who wrights against marriage who must deal with his crazy, homicidal family and local police in Brooklyn, New York, as he debates whether to go through with a honeymoon with the woman he loves and has recently agreed to marry...Categorized as:
classics crime historical-fiction humor literary-fiction 20th-century adult anthologies -
The Scarlet Pimpernel by Emmuska Orczy
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 42 ratingsThe first and most successful in the Baroness’s series of books that feature Percy Blakeney, who leads a double life as an English fop and a swashbuckling rescuer of aristocrats, The Scarlet Pimpernel was the blueprint for what became known as the masked-avenger genre...Categorized as:
classics crime historical-fiction humor literary-fiction politics 20th-century action-adventure -
The Crime Wave at Blandings by P.G. Wodehouse
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsOne of P.G. Wodehouse's most gloriously funny stories, this is the tale of bumbling Lord Emsworth, whose quiet life reading "The Care Of The Pig" and pottering among the flowers at Blandings Castle is shattered by an outbreak of lawlessness involving his niece Jane (the third prettiest girl in Shropshire), an airgun - and the trouser seat of the abominable Baxter... -
Jeeves and the King of Clubs by Ben Schott
Rated: 4.14 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsStorm clouds loom over Europe. Treason is afoot in the highest social circles. The very security of the nation is in peril. Jeeves, it transpires, has long been an agent of British Intelligence, but now His Majesty's Government must turn to the one man who can help . . . Bertie Wooster.In this magnificent new homage to P. G...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction humor literary-fiction action-adventure adult audiobook book -
Electric Barracuda by Tim Dorsey
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 16 ratings“Dorsey differs from writers such as Carl Hiassen, James Hall, and Elmore Leonard…These guys fire bullets. Dorsey makes sure his gun is filled with hollow-point.”—Sarasota Herald TribuneReaders who can’t get enough of lovable serial killer Serge A. Storms can rejoice...Categorized as:
crime humor literary-fiction satire 21st-century action-adventure adult amateur-sleuth -
Miss Buncle's Book by D.E. Stevenson
Rated: 4.10 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsThe storyline of Miss Buncle's Book (1934) is a simple one: Barbara Buncle, who is unmarried and perhaps in her late 30s, lives in a small village and writes a novel about it in order to try and supplement her meagre income. D.E. Stevenson had an enormously successful writing career: between 1923 and 1970, four million copies of her books were sold in Britain and three million in the States...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction humor literary-fiction satire 20th-century adult audiobook -
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Our Mutual Friend by Charles Dickens
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsA satiric masterpiece about the allure and peril of money, Our Mutual Friend revolves around the inheritance of a dust-heap where the rich throw their trash. When the body of John Harmon, the dust-heap’s expected heir, is found in the Thames, fortunes change hands surprisingly, raising to new heights “Noddy” Boffin, a low-born but kindly clerk who becomes “the Golden Dustman... -
The Complete Stories of Robert Louis Stevenson: Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and Nineteen Other Tales by Robert Louis Stevenson
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsThe complexity and range of Robert Louis Stevenson's short fiction reveals his genius perhaps more than any other medium. Here, leading Stevenson scholar Barry Menikoff arranges and introduces the complete selection of Stevenson's brilliant stories, including the famed masterpiece Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr... -
Quick Service by P.G. Wodehouse
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsWhen imperious American widow Beatice Chavender eats a forkful of inferior ham at her sister's country home near London, it affects the lives of everyone around her--her sister, her brother-in-law, her sister's butler, her sister's poor relation Sally, Sally's fiance Lord Holbeton, and, most of all, Mrs. Chavender's own one-time fiance, "Ham King" J.B... -
The Pope of Palm Beach by Tim Dorsey
Rated: 4.07 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsFrom Florida’s king of mayhem—"compulsively irreverent and shockingly funny" (Boston Globe) New York Times bestselling author Tim Dorsey—comes a diabolically madcap adventure featuring the indomitable Serge A. Storms.No one worships the Sunshine State as much as Serge A. Storms. Perpetually hunting Floridian arcana and lore, he and his permanently baked sidekick, Coleman, are on the road again...Categorized as:
crime historical-fiction humor satire action-adventure adult amateur-sleuth audiobook -
How Right You Are, Jeeves by P.G. Wodehouse
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsA Bertie and Jeeves classic, featuring a cow-creamer, the redheaded Miss Wickham, and the formidable schoolmaster Aubrey Upjohn. Jeeves is infallible. Jeeves is indispensable. Unfortunately, in How Right You Are, Jeeves, he is also in absentia. In this wonderful slice of Woosterian mayhem, Bertie has sent that prince among gentlemen's gentlemen off on his annual vacation...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction humor literary-fiction satire 20th-century adult audiobook -
Village School by Miss Read
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsThe first novel in the beloved Fairacre series, Village School introduces the remarkable schoolmistress Miss Read and her lovable group of children, who, with a mixture of skinned knees and smiles, are just as likely to lose themselves as their mittens...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction humor literary-fiction 20th-century adult audiobook book -
Something Fresh by P.G. Wodehouse
Rated: 4.04 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsOne thing that constantly disrupts the peace of life at Blandings is the constant incursion of impostors. Blandings has impostors like other houses have mice. Now there are two of them – both intent on a dangerous enterprise...Categorized as:
classics crime historical-fiction humor literary-fiction satire 20th-century action-adventure -
Parnassus on Wheels by Christopher Morley
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsRoger Mifflin is part pixie, part sage, part noble savage, and all God's creature. With his traveling book wagon named Parnassus, he moves through the New England countryside of 1915 on an itinerant mission of enlightenment. Mifflin's delight in books and authors is infectious--with his singular philosophy and bright eyes, he comes to represent the heart and soul of the book world...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction humor literary-fiction 20th-century action-adventure adult audiobook -
Psmith, Journalist by P.G. Wodehouse
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsThe story begins with Psmith accompanying his fellow Cambridge student Mike to New York on a cricketing tour. Through high spirits and force of personality, Psmith takes charge of a minor periodical, and becomes imbroiled in a scandal involving slum landlords, boxers and gangsters - the story displays a strong social conscience, rare in Wodehouse's generally light-hearted works...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction humor 20th-century action-adventure adult audiobook book -
Fat City by Leonard Gardner
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsFat City is a novel about the indestructibility of of hope, the anguish and comedy of the human condition. It tells the story of two young boxers out of Stockton, California: Ernie Munger and Billy Tully, one in his late teens, the other just turning thirty, whose seemingly parallel lives intersect for a time... -
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Flashman and the Tiger by George MacDonald Fraser
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsFor the first time in four years comes a new book in George MacDonald Fraser's long-running series chronicling the adventures of Sir Harry Paget Flashman. Eleventh in the series, Flashman and the Tiger features not one, but three stories of international intrigue that find the fictional Flashman thrown headlong into historical events around the world...Categorized as:
classics crime historical-fiction humor literary-fiction satire 20th-century action-adventure -
Money for Nothing by P.G. Wodehouse
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 12 ratings"T. Paterson Frisby, the dyspeptic American financier, loves every cent of his twenty million dollars. Lady Vera Mace loves T. Paterson Frisby whose secretary, Berry Conway, loves Frisby's niece, Ann Moon. Meanwhile, Lady Vera's nephew, 'Biscuit' Biskerton, begins by loving Frisby's niece but ends by loving Frisby's niece's friend, Kitchie Valentine...Categorized as:
humor classics historical-fiction literary-fiction fiction comedy audiobook historical -
The Pirates! In an Adventure with Napoleon: A Novel by Gideon Defoe
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsThe Pirate Captain and his merry band of ne’er-do-wells face off against their toughest—but by no means their tallest—challenge yet. Crushed with disappointment at the Pirate of the Year Awards, our Pirate Captain decides that it’s time for a career change. And so with his loyal (if soon-to-be-dismayed) crew, he sets off for St... -
Unforgiving Years by Victor Serge, Дмитрий Петров
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsUnforgiving Years is a thrilling and terrifying journey into the disastrous, blazing core of the twentieth century. Victor Serge’s final work, here translated into English for the first time, is at once the most ambitious, bleakest, and most lyrical of this neglected major writer’s works.The novel is arranged into four sections, like the panels of an immense mural or the movements of a symphony...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction humor literary-fiction politics satire 20th-century action-adventure -
The Picture of Dorian Gray and Three Stories by Oscar Wilde
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 23 ratings"The Picture of Dorian Gray, " Wilde's only full-length novel, is the enduringly eerie fable of a portrait that ages and decays as its model remains ever young and beautiful. Dorian Gray, a naive and irresistible young man, is lured by decadent Lord Henry Wotton into a life of depravity... -
The Big Book of Sherlock Holmes Stories by Otto Penzler
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsPresenting Edgar Award-winning editor Otto Penzler's latest anthology, The Big Book of Sherlock Holmes Stories, the largest collection of Sherlockian tales ever assembled—now in a deluxe hardcover edition, perfect for the collector and gift markets.Arguably no other character in history has been so enduringly popular as Sherlock Holmes... -
2028 by Ken Saunders
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 6 ratings2028. Prime Minister Fitzwilliams' instincts tell him it's time to call a snap election. His cabinet team is adequate (just), the howling protests of the doctors after the GP changes has finally died down and, best of all, the Australian Greens are in receivership... -
Beasts and Super-Beasts by Saki
Rated: 4.11 of 5 stars · 13 ratingsShort excerpt: I wish you would turn me into a wolf Mr. Bilsiter said his hostess at luncheon the day after his arrival... -
Lord Emsworth and Others by P.G. Wodehouse
Rated: 4.07 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsIn Lord Emsworth and Others, readers are treated to a selection of familiar characters and places, in new and unfamiliar circumstances. Fans and initiates will be highly entertained... -
Queen Lucia by E.F. Benson
Rated: 3.94 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsQueen Lucia is the first book in the Mapp and Lucia series. Mrs. Lucas, Lucia to her intimates, resides in the village of Riseholme, a pretty Elizabethan village in Worcestershire, where she vigorously guards her status as "Queen" despite occasional attempts from her subjects to overthrow her. Lucia’s dear friend Georgie Pillson both worships Lucia and occasionally works to subvert her power...Categorized as:
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The Untouchable by John Banville
Rated: 3.94 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsOne of the most dazzling and adventurous writers now working in English takes on the enigma of the Cambridge spies in a novel of exquisite menace, biting social comedy, and vertiginous moral complexity. The narrator is the elderly Victor Maskell, formerly of British intelligence, for many years art expert to the Queen...Categorized as:
classics crime historical-fiction humor literary-fiction politics 20th-century adult -
Miss Buncle Married by D.E. Stevenson
Rated: 3.94 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsMiss Buncle Married is a sequel to Miss Buncle's Book , in which Barbara Buncle's novel caused havoc in her home village. Early in Miss Buncle Married Arthur thinks: ‘But I really hope, in a way, that [Barbara] won’t want to write ..Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction humor literary-fiction satire 20th-century adult audiobook -
The Affair of the Mutilated Mink by James Anderson
Rated: 3.92 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsThe Earl of Burford hosts another slightly batty, thoroughly baffling house party....George Henry Alwyn Saunders, 12th in his line, has taken a fancy to films. He's nearly killed with delight when a movie mogul wants Alderly, the Burfords' 17th century country estate, for the set of a new Rex Ransom epic... -
The Bolingbroke Chit by Lynn Messina
Rated: 3.92 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsEarning the nickname Lady Agony was no minor achievement for Lady Agatha Bolingbroke. It required a great deal of effort to make herself so disagreeable, but she did it for a good cause: The fewer invitations she received, the more time she had to paint. Her mother, refusing to accept an unpopular daughter—or, worse, a talented one—insists on dragging her to every event of the season... -
Bartleby the Scrivener by Herman Melville
Rated: 3.93 of 5 stars · 32 ratingsAcademics hail it as the beginning of modernism, but to readers around the world—even those daunted by Moby-Dick—Bartleby the Scrivener is simply one of the most absorbing and moving novellas ever... -
The Case of the Not-So-Nice Nurse by Mabel Maney
Rated: 3.88 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsNurse Cherry Aimless’s first vacation from her hectic career in a big-city hospital takes her to visit her spinster Aunt Gertrude in thrilling San Francisco. Wistfully trading her starched white cap and dress for a bright yellow poplin frock with a flared skirt, young Cherry takes to the highway, never imagining the gay adventures that await her...
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