Good Omens – Neil Gaiman & Terry Prachett – review

The end of times is on its way. The apocalypse is supposed to be terrifying, the world is ending. What if the end of the world doesn’t go quite as planned? What if the angel and demon in charge of starting the whole thing, make a few mistakes? What if the anti-christ isn’t brought up in a tough and angry home but a quiet suburban family? What if the four horseman decide they are bikers instead? The apocalypse may seem scary but that is only if the people in charge actually know what they are doing.

The characters in this book are what make this one so much fun. This was a reread for me. I read it ages ago and remembered it vaguely. I did remember that I thought it was fun and near the end of the year I needed a fun and quirky book to read.

The angel, Aziraphale, and demon Crowly are my favorite characters in this book. I loved how they played off each other. They are friends, do their jobs because they have too but are super reluctant to end the world. They like Earth and humanity. They enjoy being around people and they don’t want to give any of that up.

They were interesting because they felt like tired office workers to me. They felt like two normal guys who are fed up with their jobs. They stay with their employers out of necessity but they don’t quite agree with everything. They go along because they have to but you can feel their reluctance and avoidance of the issue.

I like that they were close as friends. This way they used each other to vent when necessary was fun. I thought it was an interesting dynamic and I could read an entire book just about the two of them.

The tone of this book was relaxing and enjoyable. Apocalypse books are usually stressful and fill you with fear and trepidation. This one just made you wonder if the end of the world is actually possible. Judging by the random things happening in our world everyday you wonder if these agents are in charge. Constanly messing up, not caring and not wanting to finish out what they started. They all felt human and it felt like anyone I know could have been in this scenario.

The four horsemen characters were interesting as well. They were the ones that felt closest to what we know they are supposed to be. They are menacing but still with a silly, quirky edge to them. You feel their presences but you aren’t scared of them. They are again just doing what they are told but not forcing anything. Just workers showing up but not putting their full effort into their jobs.

I did think the ending was a bit flat. I thought it worked but you are leading up to this huge end and it sort of fizzled out for me. It was a lot more talking then I remembered. I wanted them to be running around trying to stop each others mistakes but instead you get speeches.

The ending worked for the story but it wasn’t what I was expecting or what I remembered. I thought it could have used a bit more punch or a few more laugh moments to get finishing the book with the same tone as it started. You have these fumbling idiots running around the whole time but they all kind of just stand around at the end.

There wasn’t anything that threw me out of the story completely. I stayed in the world and connected to the characters. It was a fun and interesting ride.

I gave this book 4 stars. It would have been a five star if the ending was a bit more involved.

“They’d been brought up to it and weren’t, when you got right down to is, particularly evil. Human beings mostly aren’t. They just get carried away by new ides, like dressing up in jackboots and shooting people, or dressing up in white sheets and lynching people, or dressing up in tie-dye jeans and playing guitars at people. Offer people a new creed with a costume and their hearts and minds will follow.” (pg. 18)

“They were born into a world that was against them in a thousand little ways , and then devoted most of their energies to making it worse.” (pg. 25)

“Hell wasn’t a major reservoir of evil, any more than Heaven, in Crowley’s opinion, was a fountain of goodness; they were just sides in the great cosmic chess game. Where you found the real McCoy, the real grace and the real heart-stopping evil, was right inside the human mind.” (pg. 69)