Lisa's Reviews > Good Omens

In the beginning, there were a few words, and the words were with Neil Gaiman, and he saw that they were good words, so he passed them on to Terry Pratchett, so that he could make light of them. And it was morning (and Neil slept and Terry wrote) and it was night (and Terry slept and Neil wrote) - the first chapter.

Thus (or similarly, for the book in the book is only rarely cited directly!) spoke Agnes Nutter, the nice and very accurate prophetess.

She would also have said (if she had been blessed or cursed with not only the facts, but also with the UNDERSTANDING of the facts) that it was prophesied that the bible was written to become the confusing yet entertaining template for a masterpiece of comic fiction - and everybody knows that is a devilishly hard task to pull off, the comic genre being the most complicated one, but divine if if works out! (The reason holy books aren't funny is that they haven't gained the required level of sophistication yet - they take themselves too literally and too seriously, and that is stylistical suicide, as we all know from listening to the holy books' human personifications - the preachers and politicians - which is why they are better suited to be comic material than comedy show producers).

If anybody (Agnes Nutter for example) had told me in 1990 that there was a recently published book which told the incredible story of the world in 2019 and showed the perfect parable of our current mess in the body of an Antichrist - born to save the world from destruction by the joint narcissism of Heaven and Hell - and that the said Antichrist would take the shape of an 11-year-old environmentalist worrying about our eco systems, I would have been doubtful. I would even have said it sounded way too much like the conspiring universe of the unbearable awfulness of The Alchemist, which was interestingly written at about the same time (proving that stupidity and brilliance are only a sense of humour apart!).

So I guess the International Express delivery man had clear instructions not to deliver Good Omens to me until I had finally got ready for it by watching human nature carrying out the work gods and devils were paid to do (and I don't mean the M25 London Orbital specifically, even though it is a masterpiece both Heaven and Hell claim).

Now that I have been provided with the Good Omens (it really is quite strange how references to that sheepish ANTI-NOVEL keep sneaking into the review of THE NOVEL), I have to spoil the fun and tell you all that Armageddon is off the table. It was an idea that didn't work out in practical terms, as the Antichrist pointed out quite cleverly: it can't be about having a winning and a losing side, as the "winners" will want to continue the squabble and turn on each other. It is about making the best of the mess. About "not getting along" in peace!

Good Omens is a joyride to the tune of Europe's Final Countdown, unsubtly interrupted in medias res by Queen singing The Show Must Go On...

Amen.