It

by Stephen King

It was the children who saw - and felt - what made the town so horribly different. In the storm drains and sewers 'It' lurked, taking the shape of every nightmare, each one's deepest dread. As the children grow up and move away, the horror of 'It' is buried deep - until they are called back.

• ISBN10: 0450411435
• ISBN13: 9780450411434
• Publish Date: 1 October 1987 (first published 31 December 1925)
• Publish Status: Out of Print
• Out of Print: 3 December 2007
• Publish Country: GB
• Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton
• Imprint: Hodder Paperback
• Edition: New edition
• Format: Paperback (A-Format (178x111 mm))
• Pages: 1120
• Language: English

Reviews

[kiracanread]

Incredibly well written and an enjoyable introduction to the works of Stephen King. Although I could not possibly give this book 5 stars due to the length. Not that the length is a bad thing, but the amount of different plot lines, backstories and twists that stretch throughout the book make it incredibly difficult to remember and recall the previous happenings.

[EBookObsessed]

I had originally read It in 1986 when it was first released. After it was announced that a new movie was in production, I had to re-read it so it would be fresh in my memory.

While this is one of the top Stephen King novels, the new film varied so much from the novel (and I don't just mean that it was only just the kids or now set in 1989) that rereading only made the obvious changes that much fresher in my mind.

Both the novel and the film are worth reading/watching on their own but comparisons are worthless since the film presented its own interpretation but grabbed more of the raw horror from the novel.

[thepunktheory]

I have a bit of love/hate relationship with Stephen King. His novels are truly frightening, the stuff that nightmares are made of. But, yes here is the big but, no matter how thrilling his books are, you have to admit that his way of writing is a bit trashy. Not too long ago I read George R. R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series where almost every sentence is a beautiful piece of art. It's funny how different King's style of writing is, yet you cannot put the book down. It may not be the best of writing, but it is most certainly the most thrilling.
First of all, I like the way King tells this story. He alternates between the present day (or whatever you could consider the present day at the time the book was written) and flashbacks of 1958. The horror slowly starts to unfold and before you know you are sucked into the story and you almost feel like one of the 6 friends.
The way evil is portrayed is also very relatable. The monster bears a different face for everyone, picturing your biggest fear. You will end up wondering what it would look like to you!
Before I leave you with a recommendation for this novel, let me say that it is most definitely not for the faint of heart.
Many of Stephen King's works a pretty fucked up, but this one really made me wonder how on earth you can come up with stuff like that.

However, despite some rather revolting moments you will not be able to put the book down. Truly a great horror novel!

[Melanie]

My review and an extended sample of the audiobook are posted at Hotlistens.com.

4.5 stars

It has been on my list to try for a long time. I love Stephen King and I remember watching the TV miniseries when I was in high school. However, the length of this book was always the thing that prevented me from picking it up. The book is 1,093 pages and the audio at 44 hours and 57 minutes, it is not a light read/listen. However, when I heard they were remaking this into a feature film, I decided I had to read it before it hit theaters. I’m so glad that I did. It was such a fun book.

This is the story of friendship above all else. It goes back in forth in time between when these seven kids were about eleven years old and twenty seven years later as middle aged adults. It starts with Bill’s little brother Georgie building a paper boat that he sails down the flooded storm gutters in the streets. Georgie does not survive his encounter with Pennywise the Clown. Georgie isn’t the first or the last child to go missing or be killed in Derry, Maine.

If you haven’t read the book, but have watched the miniseries, there is a second prologue that is in the book that was completely left out of the show. It is basically the preamble to how the killings start in Derry for the adult years. It also shows that Pennywise doesn’t do all of his own killing. Here, he starts a mob going after a gay couple coming out of a gay bar in the homophobic town. One of the gay men ends up dead. The clown is there, but he didn’t do the deed himself.

We learn about each of the seven members of the “losers club”, both as children and as adults. We see how all the ones who left Derry become very successful at what they do, while Mike Hanlon stays behind as the town’s librarian. It was a good thing that he did stay in town. It seems that he is the only one who remembers anything. All the others pretty much forgot everything that happened while they were in Derry. Even to the point that Bill didn’t tell his wife that his brother was murdered, just that he died. He had forgotten that his brother was murdered.

While this was a long story, I was entranced the entire time. There is not a single section of the book that I wish was shorter. Not a single part that I wish I could’ve skipped or sped through quicker. I loved learning about each of the characters, as both children and as adults. I loved watching their friendship build. Like I said, this is the story of a great friendship. Without that friendship, they never would’ve survived or won in the end (either as children or when they came back together as adults).

This story is also very, very creepy. It is a Stephen King book, after all. This book is full of some pretty creepy things. I won’t go into details, one, so as not to spoil any surprises for anyone who decides to try this book, two, so as not to gross out anyone who maybe isn’t much of a horror fan. Let’s just say that King didn’t pull any punches.

Narration
This is the first books that I’ve listened to with Steven Weber. I have to admit, he did an amazing job. I don’t know if you could’ve found a better person to narrate this book. Not only did he have to voice these characters as eleven-year-olds and as thirty-eight-year-olds. He also had to handle the many different voices from Richie Tozier, who was constantly making different voices. While there was only one girl in the “Losers Club” there were mothers and other women that he had to navigate including the mother of Eddie Kaspbrak, who sorta reminded me of Howard Wolowit’s mother (from the Big Bang Theory). Another thing that I really liked was how he would change his pace to help set the scene. There are several scenes where the kids are really scared and they are maybe running from Pennywise or something else (he didn’t always appear as a clown). He would start talking much faster as the scene intensified and then would come back to a normal pace once the scariness was over. I think he really helped me get through this book. As much as I loved the story, it would be very hard to get through a story of this length reading, but listening to it really helped bring it to life. I didn’t want it to end.

“Hi-Yo, Silver! Away!”

I read this a long time ago and it was such a fantastic book, even though it freaked me out. It is such a classic and I still remember it even today.

I would recommend this to anybody looking for some good horror books.

[celinenyx]

I finally finished it. I finally finished It
I don't know where to start this. First, this book is looong. It's both it's strength and it's weakness.

You get totally sucked into the story, you get to love all the characters, know their strengths, know their weaknesses, know their family, know their fears. They start to become a piece of you.

On the other side, it is a heavy burden to carry around. I think I read this book in about four months and I think I read in it almost every day. After a while, I even started to get scared of It. It was getting so creepy, I didn't even dare to put the book at my nightstand at night.

Although it was quite lengthy, it really is storytelling at it's best. Still, there are some flaws.

The Turtle was just totally weird. It gets first mentioned at around page 300, and then you don't hear anything about him(?) for about 700 pages. I was really wondering if Mr. King had left us a loose end. Then, when the Turtle finally did came, he was a bit well, not ancient? I can't recall what he said exactly, but it struck me as a bit odd that creature that has always been there talks like that.

Some spoilers ahead.
I liked the little twist of "It" at the end. The end was quite good, it felt like it couldn't have ended any other way. Maybe the orgy bit was a little bit, well, too much, especially the birds (omg, the birds, what type of girl thinks of birds at that type of moment?).
The destruction of Derry could have been a little less detailed. I liked reading about the buildings and the streets, but after the library and the mall and the bars and the restaurants and the bridge.. well, you get my point.

I think I'm already forgetting the details. Maybe that's for the best. I will only remember I love them, and that will be enough.
Until next time.