whenever i’m writing in good omens ‘verse and can’t find the voice this is what i do: pick up the book, open to random page, read 5 pages. put a smarmy and very sarcastic british accent on the voice in my head, the sort of voice you laugh at until you’re gasping but also want to hit a little bit. make paragraphs shorter. no, i mean shorter. less is more. don’t describe anything unless you absolutely must. if you have a long paragraph, it should be mostly one run-on sentence with no less than three jokes in the middle. everybody says what they mean but in a plausible deniability type way. they’re really not that vague though, and the places where they’re really un-vague they’re so upfront its uncomfortable. have one character doing something extraordinary while the other one seems not to notice. when in doubt, change the scene. start or end scenes in the middle of the action so things keep zipping along. finally: you can use your fucking adverbs. go hog wild. adverb adverbfully all over the page. in fact, no dialogue tags unless there’s an adverb, in which case, fine. congratulations, you have gooded an omen.
i didn’t really expect anyone to take this seriously so i want to add for those who are looking at it as genuine writing advice: this is a paragraph on how good omens as a text is constructed and how you can maybe capture some of that vibe, but this is not a how-to as to how you ought to write a thing for your own self. use your own voice!! and you can add some of these things as a supplement if you want, and if you don’t want, that’s cool too. you don’t have to do any of these things to write in good omens ‘verse or in any other. your voice is valid and has power and has importance because only you can say things the way you say them. anyway love you writers have fun
arcticflakes
