Monday, March 20, 2006

Good Omens By Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett

Good Omens is a cult novel by two giants of the Sci Fi Fantasy genre. It came out in 1990 yet has been out of print for a long time. I don't really know why Good Omens has been reissued and promoted so much but it piqued my interest when I saw the strolling. I was originally reading another book but I got bored with it and realized hey why shelf reading be a chore. I just wasn't into it and that is the point of all this. I know there are people out there who are HUUUGE Gaiman and Pratchett fans. I read some of the Sandman and have never read any of protectors work but I will try to rectify that now. The plot of Good Omens is basically an angel and a demon realize the antichrist has been born and that means the end of times is near. The problem is they both have gotten very comfortable on Earth as Crowley(the demon)explains to Aziraphale(the angel) " you won't find one decent Sushi restaauraubt in heaven". So the two celestial beings decide to team up and stop the impending Armageddon. In the meantime you have a whole slew of rich characters, including an old witchfinder sergeant, an 11 year old antichrist who would really rather hang out with his mates, his dog a legendary hell hound that is really a little mutt good at scaring cats and the four horsemen or bikers. This is a funny book the plot is silly and moving without turning you off and taking me out the story. It really is interesting to think about who wrote what and where certain themes came through. The danger in a book like this ( for me at least ) is satire is very hard. By definitions it is not a real story so you could really get taken out of thuds story but I wasn't I had a great time and highly recommend this to fans of Douglas Adams or Monty python I know this is obvious because they are British but you can't deny it.