I'm a big fan of humor writing, especially tales with an ethnic twist. Maybe that comes from being the product of a religiously mixed (Protestant/Jewish with some Catholic a bit further back) marriage. Or from growing up in industrial Connecticut, where Poles, Germans, Italians, Puerto Ricans and others came for jobs. (The infield on one of my baseball teams was Kozlowski, Borowski, Oparowski and Rosenthal.)

My favorite in this category was Foreskin's Lament by Shalom Auslander, who gave a reading at Breathe Books in Hampden.  Auslander's memoir recounts his rebellion against Orthodox Judaism and family dysfunction. He constantly challenges God, the rabbis and his parents to see how far he can stray. Still, he can never relax and enjoy his rebellion, because he fears a last-minute cosmic vengeance directed at him and his family. The story is both hilarious and sad, but the writing is always terrific. 

A sampling: God "liked us so much that he killed anyone who didn't like us. But when we didn't obey what he had commended, he didn't like us. He hated us. Some days he hated us so much, he killed us; other days, he let other people kill us. We call these days "holidays."