Good Omens is a classic piece of comedic fiction which is witty, subtle and often down right hilarious; but it is a little shot on actual plot, character development and I highly doubt any publisher would touch it today.
So, confession time. This is the first time I have read any book by Terry Pratchett. I’ve looked at loads but the problem was always I did not know where to start with them when I saw them on the second hand book stalls which were my mainstay and the covers always seemed a bit…busy for my tastes. I have however read some of Neil Gaiman’s works so I had a rough idea on what to expect.
Good Omens tells the story of the coming of the antichrist and the actions of a fallen angel (Crowley) and an actual angel (Aziraphale) who have both become rather fond of life on Earth and therefore work to stop its destruction. Their plan? To place the newborn anti-Christ in an environment where he is around both good and evil and therefore will support neither heaven or hell. The problem? Well the baby got mixed up with another child in the hospital and as a result the two angels end up rather wasting their time. The antichrist grows up in a normal English village and comes into his powers; eventually destroying three of the four horseman of the apocalypse and stopping the destruction of Earth. Along the way there are a number of side characters with entertaining names such as Anathema Device all of whom serve as heralds of the forthcoming apocalypse without actually realising it.
So it’s now considered a classic but with the way characters are portrayed I could see it coming in for a world of criticism now and that’s a shame because this is actually a very clever book. Whilst it comes across as two authors just trying to make the other laugh there is a lot here that can easily be missed in the first readthrough. Names are important in this book and there are many plays on words which generally had me laughing at the irony inherent in them. I also found the idea of pestilence retiring as one of the four horsemen to be replaced by pollution rather apt given the current course of world events. I did also enjoy the idea of war making a living as a seductive arms dealer and later reporter and it’s a shame that more time was not spent on the four horseman.
This very much feels like a book a group of friends put together to make each other laugh; rather than a project aimed at mass publication and a particular marketing demographic and I think that’s something seldom seen now. This is fun to read because the authors wanted to have fun writing it and that shows in the text. My only real criticism is that I do think there could have been a little more character development other puns, insinuation and slightly slapstick comedy.
Overall though this is a great little read and well worth checking out for the holiday period.
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