GUEST BLOGGER: GOLFWIDOW!

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Hi, this is Golf Widow, guest-blogging for Michael today.

Normally on Friday, it's Friday Movie Suggestion Night, but in "light" of our increasingly across-the-board alarming costs for electricity and fuel, I've decided that I'm turning off my television and my DVD player on Friday night, April 4th.

In fact, I think I'll turn the lights off as well.

So this Friday night, it's Friday BOOK Suggestion Night, By Candlelight.

What you will need is a candle in a sturdy, appropriate candleholder (I'm using a hurricane candle set in a heatproof candle dish, myself), a flame provider (I have a butane lighter shaped like a penguin, courtesy of Andy Martello), and a copy of the book I'm going to recommend right now ...

GOOD OMENS:
(THE NICE AND ACCURATE PROPHECIES
OF AGNES NUTTER, WITCH)
by
Neil Gaiman
and
Terry Pratchett

This book is still very much in print, and should be available at your local bookstore or library. I know for sure it's available online; it's a classic for its time and wildly popular.

Optionally, you'll also need a snack. I'm going to go with carrot sticks, because they require no fossil fuels to prepare and they don't leave crumbs in the pages, but I am, by no means, the Popcorn Police - have whatever you like best.

Also optionally, if you have an iPod or a battery-powered CD/cassette player, load it up with as many Queen songs as you can find. It helps set the mood.

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I chose this book for one very important reason. It's one of my favorites, and it's really funny. Two reasons. It's one of my favorites, and it's really funny, and it references a lot of really great Queen songs. Three reasons. It's one of my favorites, and it's really funny, and it references a lot of really great Queen songs, and you're not going to be able to say, "Oh, well, I'll just wait for the movie," because it's been about fifteen years now and I don't think anyone's ever going to agree on how properly to convey any of this onto the big screen. Sorry, I'll come in again.

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The style of this story is, for the most part, kind of confusing at first. The time periods jump from that of the Biblical story of Genesis, to about the copyright time (early 1990s), backward to about eleven years prior to that, and round and round she goes.

Furthermore, there are footnotes everywhere, which make the average reader freak out: "I didn't know there was going to be a quiz!"

Even furthermore, the tone of the text is that of traditional British humor (or, I suppose, "humour"), in the manner of Monty Python, Douglas Adams, or Doctor Who.

I promise you, stick with all of this stuff. It's incredibly funny. Including the footnotes. Really.

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The basic premise of the story is: "What if the Antichrist decided he didn't feel like doing the whole Armaggedon thing?"

This premise is set up with the birth of the Antichrist (the part taking place eleven years prior) and the assignment of two supernatural entities: an angel sent from heaven, and a demon sent from hell, to manipulate the child's environment (switch the Antichrist infant with the newborn child of an American attaché in England), thus setting him on the predestined path to the end of the world.

Unfortunately, the Powers that Be fail to notice that the two entities they have chosen are the angel Aziraphale (who is just enough of a bastard to be worth knowing) and the demon Crowley (who isn't so much a "fallen"angel as one who "sauntered vaguely downward"), and that two such entities would, having had since the Biblical Genesis to get to know one another, probably be on pretty good professional terms, if not friends in the strictest sense.

They also fail to notice that an additional boy child has been born on the same night, and the seemingly-easy baby swap has now become an unfathomable game of Three Baby Monte.

Aziraphale and Crowley, with the help of a variety of humans (most notably, a 17th century witch and her last surviving descendent; the last two soldiers of the infamous Witchfinder Army; a delightful phony clairvoyant; and a trio of kids who are best friends with Antichrist Adam Young), not to mention The Four Horsemen (now bikers, the only "real" Hell's Angels) of the Apocalypse, and a Hell Hound named Dog, set about interfering with Adam's environment rather than steering him in one direction or the other.

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Without giving the ending away completely, I can assure you that everything turns out nicely (as in "nice and accurate" and ALSO in the traditional definition of "niceness"), which you already know, because the world is still here.

You might need to reread this book after you finish it, particularly if, like me, you skipped all the footnotes the first time. Do go back and read them. They're as funny as the rest of the text.

It also helps if you stick a bookmark into the section at the beginning where they list who the characters are, and refer to it as needed.

Lastly, be glad that you're at home, reading by candlelight, and not in a public place, because you will laugh out loud, and some people frown upon that sort of behavior, especially when they're not in on the joke.

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Final note, not related to the book, but to one of its co-authors, Terry Pratchett:

Terry has been diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer's Disease. He is in a desperate struggle to accomplish as much as he can in the time he has, and is also working very hard to raise funds for Alzheimer's Research, to see if a cure can be found as quickly as possible, now that he has a vested interest in doing so. This is also a cause near and dear to my own heart, as my own family has been affected by it, and some of your own have as well.

Terry has himself already donated

£500,000 ($1 million US dollars)

and invites us to join together and further the cause. Visit Match It for Pratchett and help as much as you can. You don't need to go beyond your means ... he doesn't expect one person to give as much as he has. In fact, my posting this here cost me, precisely, nothing.

(However, in my defense, I did donate $5 US, which was all I could afford.)

And now, back to the end of the Friday Book Suggestion Night, By Candlelight Stuff, which, if we follow Michael's normal style of post, means we need a tagline, in very large letters:

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APOCALYPSE? NOW?
(BUT IT'S JUST GETTING GOOD!)

(And don't forget to come back tomorrow to wish Michael a Happy Birthday!)