GOOD OMENS, Terry Pratchett, Neil Gaiman

In my other journal I'm posting about my recent trip to Texas, with possibly way too many photos.  The only book I took with me (though I acquired several more on my journey, of course) was Good Omens, by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman.  Since I was occupied all day and most of the evening doing stuff with family and friends, I only had time to read a few pages every night before falling into a dazed coma.  I got about halfway through and finished it when I got back. 

Really though, I didn't WANT to finish it.  It was so deliciously, so -dare I say- fiendishly funny and arch, that I could have enjoyed it for many more pages.  It's the funniest book about Armageddon you'll ever hope to read.  Yes, those who are hoping for the End Time and the Rapture, etc, need to get a different view than Tim LaHaye's of this cataclysmic event.  One of the many things I love about Neil Gaiman is his view of humanity, in all its horrible nastiness, unprepossessing kindness, foolishness, stupidity, cupidity, openhearted love and goodness.  This book is populated by humans, both adult and child, witches, witch-hunters, angels, demons, and the Antichrist.  An angel and a demon are two of the main characters, both have lived on earth from the beginning, and have come to quite like living in human form, enjoying their own particular earthly pleasures - from rare books to vintage cars.  It has been their job to engineer the world's end, the Apocalypse, the Final Battle - by placing the infant Antichrist with a family, and when things are ready for it - precipitating the clash of angelic forces.  Even other-worldly beings can change their minds, disobey orders, follow their own wills, and it's what these guys just might decide to do.

The placing of infants goes awry and life events proceed in their own surprising way.  The Antichrist grows up loving his corner of this beautiful planet fiercely, and his place in it.  His name is Adam Young  (no symbolism there!), and I loved him and his gang of four - Who are mirrored in the Four Bikers of the Apocalypse late in the book, a wickedly delightful touch. 

Oh, just read it.  Gaiman and Pratchett know that the Mighty Powers of Heaven and Hell can't damage and distress us any more than we can one another and ourselves.  The demons are constantly surprised by how hateful humans can be; surprised and outdone, amazed.  And yet, this is a funny funny book about human love and earthly salvation.  Eat your hearts out, Left Behinders.

IF, I were still in school, and a Literature major, or even a Theology major (either of which I could be, just for fun), I would pull together the Phillip Pullman books in the trilogy, His Dark Materials, and all of Gaiman's books, and do a thesis on the theology/mythology/escatology contained therein.  There is so much, and there are so many parallels, though Pullman is serious in his fantasy, and Gaiman is....I don't quite have the right words for what I want to express here.  Not that he's not serious, but he's not the same kind of serious, no not at all.  Anyway, maybe someone somewhere is already working on this idea, for a thesis or a lit-crit scholarly magazine article, etc.  I just think it would be boatloads of fun.