Good Omens by Terri Pratchett and Neil Gaiman

Title
Good Omens

Author
Terry Pratchett
Neil Gaiman

Copyright
1990



This is another book for the weird and wild mind of Sayshana. I read it, I liked it, although was vaguely aware that reading it just might be sacriligious, and for some bizarre reason that vaguely bothered me. So here's the premise of the book, an angel and a demon have been living in the same area for so long that they've more or less become friends. They do drink together regularly, though, and have typical "we're drunk, yet philosophical" discussions that pretty much everyone has on a good friday night.

Our friendly little demon (named Crowley, haha writers so clever), has been given the job of delivering the AntiChrist to an evil nunnery where it is quickly switched with a regular baby and is switched with a wealthy Brittish family, or so they think. Azizraphale (i'm not sure on the spelling, but he's the angel) and Crowley make a little deal, they're both going to try and influence baby Warlock's growth and see what happens.

When little Warlock turns twelve and doesn't have any evil powers of mass destruction and mayhem, it becomes apparent that there might have been a mistake. As the time of the Apocalypse grows nearer, our heroes desperately try to locate the real AntiChrist and to prevent the end of everything.

In this story we are presented with a horde of interesting characters. They are all so bizarre and odd that on some level they seem to compete for your attention on the page. Perhaps what I found most pleasurable about reading this book was the descriptions and hyper-active descriptions that the authors use. An example of this would be the passage "gayer than a tree full of monkeys on nitrous oxide". Just brilliant and just brilliantly weird.

I reccommend reading it, but I personally didn't find it a fast read. It took me a week to get through it, mainly because the mass of characters are introduced all at roughly the same time and it does take a while to figure out who is who and what their relevance to the story is. Take your time reading it so you don't get lost, and remember, its supposed to be weird and funny!

Flight by Sherman Alexie

Title
Flight

Author
Sherman Alexie

Copyright
2007





This book is one of the best I've read in a long time. It is a story about violence, about the cycle of violence and abuse that has punctuated our American history and how we perpetuate violence through our actions. Sixteen-year-old Zits is a ward of the state. His mother died when he was six and he hasn't ever met his Indian father. As a result, he's just another kid in the foster care system being bumped from home to home.

When Zits meets Justice, a white kid that seems to have all the answers, he starts down a dark path that leads him to commit a terrible crime that results in his own death. However, this is not the end of the book. In fact, this all happens in the first fifth of the book, the real story begins when Zits finds himself on a strange vision quest, through which he experiences a series of lives all marked by violence in one form or another.

At first, Zits doesn't understand what he is seeing, but as the story progresses, he learns from each inhabitation. Don't get the wrong image here, these aren't sappy-sweet lessons, they are bitter and harsh and somewhat devastating. He learns that even muderers have something they care about, he learns that heroes are not always heroes, he learns that people tell themselves they're doing the right thing even when they know they're not. Character after character is presented to us as Zits lives through their lives. Sometimes redemption is possible for these people, but more often, not.

The themes of this book include, violence, the cycle of violence, personal identity, racial identity, foster care, abuse, and redemption. The only problem I have with this book is the ending. The ending doesn't fit for me, but truthfully, I'm glad he wrote it that way. What happens in the end? I'm not telling. Read it and find out!