Damien: Omen II by Joseph Howard

Damien: Omen II
by Joseph Howard
1978 Signet

The second film follows Damien into puberty, where he learns of his destiny to become the Anti-Christ while in military school.  The film was only notable for the extended "killed by mysterious forces" sequences, kind of a precursor to the Final Destination films, and the look of some of the cast.

Where the first book had more than the movie, this one somehow has less.  The killings are rushed through, and some of the prose reads like a children's book.  Hopefully Gordon McGill picks things up for the rest of the series.

Paperback from AbeBooks

The Omen by David Seltzer

The Omen
by David Seltzer
1976 Signet

A conspiracy within the Catholic church attempts to create an antichrist every 1000 years through the unholy union of Satan and a jackal.  The conspiracy murders the child of Jeremy and Katherine Thorn and talks Jeremy into adopting Damien, unbeknownst to Katherine.

Jeremy Thorn does ambassador stuff in a giant mansion while Katherine gets more depressed and neurotic.  Damien's nanny kills herself in the best part of the franchise (played in the movie by Jack Palance's daughter and Ripley's co-host Holly Palance), to be replaced by a mysterious new nanny and evil dog.  Threats to Damien are dispatched supernaturally in a method later perfected in the Final Destination films.

Tons of little extra details and back story pad this one out.  More about Katherine's mental health, how the nanny doesn't use toilet paper and craps in the woods every night.  The priest that gets speared molested a boy in Africa who was then forced to eat his own testicles.  The reporter gets laid in Israel and washes his penis off with his own urine to fight VD.

The book is nastier, but missing the atmosphere of dread from the film, which probably came from the Jerry Goldsmith score more than anything else.

Kindle ebook from Amazon