Foreword
People say: What was it like writing Good Omens?
And we say: We were just a couple of guys, okay? We still are. It was a summer job. We had a great time doing it, we split the money in half, and we swore never to do it again. We didn’t think it was important.
And, in a way, it still isn’t. Good Omens was written by two people who at the time were not at all well known except by the people who already knew them. They weren’t even certain it would sell. They certainly didn’t know they were going to write the most repaired book in the world. (Believe us: We have signed a delightfully large number of paperbacks that have been dropped in the bath, gone a worrying brown color, got repaired with sticky tape and string, and, in one case, consisted entirely of loose pages in a plastic bag. On the other hand, there was the guy who’d had a special box made up of walnut and silver filigree, with the paperback nestling inside on black velvet. There were silver runes on the lid. We didn’t ask.) Etiquette tip: It’s okay, more or less, to ask an author to sign your arm, but not good manners to then nip around to the tattoo parlor next door and return half an hour later to show them the inflamed result.
We didn’t know we’d do some signing tours that would be weird even by our generous standards, talking about humor in fifteen-second bursts in between newsflashes about the horrific hostage situation down at the local Burger King, being interviewed by an ill-prepared New York radio presenter who hadn’t got the message that Good Omens was a work of what we in the trade call “fiction,” and getting a stern pre-interview warning about swearing from the diminutive Director of Protocol of a public-service radio station “because you English use bad language all the time.”
In fact, neither of us swear much, especially not on the radio, but for the next hour we found ourselves automatically speaking in very short, carefully scanned sentences, while avoiding each other’s eyes.
And then there were the readers, Gawd bless them. We must have signed hundreds of thousands of copies for them by now. The books are often well read to the point of physical disintegration; if
we run across a shiny new copy, it’s usually because the owner’s previous five have been stolen by friends, struck by lightning or eaten by giant termites in Sumatra. You have been warned. Oh, and we understand there’s a copy in the Vatican library. It’d be nice to think so.
It’s been fun. And it continues.
In the beginning
IT WAS A NICE DAY.
All the days had been nice. There had been rather more than seven of them so far, and rain hadn’t been invented yet. But clouds massing east of Eden suggested that the first thunderstorm was on its way, and it was going to be a big one.
The angel of the Eastern Gate put his wings over his head to shield himself from the first drops.
“I’m sorry,” he said politely. “What was it you were saying?”
“I said, that one went down like a lead balloon,” said the serpent.
“Oh. Yes,” said the angel, whose name was Aziraphale.
“I think it was a bit of an overreaction, to be honest,” said the serpent. “I mean, first offense and everything. I can’t see what’s so bad about knowing the difference between good and evil, anyway.”
“It must be bad,” reasoned Aziraphale, in the slightly concerned tones of one who can’t see it either, and is worrying about it, “otherwise you wouldn’t have been involved.”
“They just said, Get up there and make some trouble,” said the serpent, whose name was Crawly, although he was thinking of changing it now. Crawly, he’d decided, was not him.
“Yes, but you’re a demon. I’m not sure if it’s actually possible for you to do good,” said Aziraphale. “It’s down to your basic, you know, nature. Nothing personal, you understand.”
“You’ve got to admit it’s a bit of a pantomime, though,” said Crawly. “I mean, pointing out the Tree and saying ‘Don’t Touch’ in big letters. Not very subtle, is it? I mean, why not put it on top of a high mountain or a long way off? Makes you wonder what He’s really planning.”
“Best not to speculate, really,” said Aziraphale. “You can’t second-guess ineffability, I always say. There’s Right, and there’s Wrong. If you do Wrong when you’re told to do Right, you deserve to be punished. Er.”
They sat in embarrassed silence, watching the raindrops bruise the first flowers.
Eventually Crawly said, “Didn’t you have a flaming sword?”
“Er,” said the angel. A guilty expression passed across his face, and then came back and camped there.