Good Omens

It is said that the Devil has all the best tunes.
This is broadly true. But Heaven has the best choreographers.

Good Omens

By Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman
1990
430 Pages

According to The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter,Witch (the world’s only completely accurate book of prophecies, written in 1655, before she exploded), the world will end on a Saturday. Next Saturday, in fact. Just before dinner.

So the armies of Good and Evil are amassing, Atlantis is rising, frogs are falling, tempers are flaring. Everything appears to be going according to Divine Plan. Except a somewhat fussy angel and a fast-living demon—both of whom have lived amongst Earth’s mortals since The Beginning and have grown rather fond of the lifestyle—are not actually looking forward to the coming Rapture.

And someone seems to have misplaced the Antichrist . . .

I read Good Omens for the first time about 10 years ago. It was, until this year, the only Terry Pratchett I had ever read, and I was delighted to get back into it after starting my Discworld explorations. I was not disappointed in the slightest with the re-read.

Good Omens is a story told from numerous perspectives in the days before the world is expected to end. We have an angel and a demon who like Earth quite a bit, and don’t want to see it go. We have the young Antichrist and his dog, and the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. We have the descendants of the very witch who predicated these events, and the last soldiers of the dying agency of witch hunters who captured her. Though it begins years and miles apart, it all converges upon one small town that shapes the fate of the world.

While Armageddon sounds like a heavy and dour topic, this book is anything but. It is contemporary fantasy told through the comic lens that Pratchett excels with. At the same time the story is steeped in the lore and iconography of Revelations, which, hear me out, manages to create an entire thing that is modern, inventive, and hilarious. Pratchett and Gaiman lift passages direct from the Bible and give them updated manifestations with a healthy does of humor. It quite literally puts a new spin on a old story, combining those prophecies with the narrative of the workers trying their darnest to keep them from happening.

Should You Read This?

For any fan of contemporary fantasy, this book is an absolute must. The characters are delightful (even the evil ones!), the intersecting plotlines create an inventive narrative, and the dry humor throughout makes the end of the world positively delightful. Combine it all with interesting interpretations of recognizable biblical passages (well, for someone with a Art History degree concentrated in early Christian iconography at least…) and you get a fantastic, funny, and familiar tale that makes you desperately wish that the collaboration had produced a sequel.
Summary from Goodreads