It by Stephen King is a 1,138 page, 4 pound book about a mutant clown terrorizing seven children in the town of Derry, Maine. From the outside, this looks like your standard horror novel, which is something that has never interested me. My type when it comes to books is relatively basic; typically young adult fiction. So, for me to pick up a book about a monster clown chasing 11-13 year old children through a sewer was basically unheard of.
It started with my mom, who read the book her sophomore year of high school in 1995, after the original miniseries came out in 1990. It was a cold fall day in 2017 when I was complaining about how I had not truly read a book since, like, 7th grade. Thirty-two years after the book was published and 24 years after my mom had purchased her copy of the book at the town general store in New Richmond, Ohio, I decided to take on this journey on my own.
The thing about It is that it is the kind of book that sucks you into its story from the beginning, but not because of the gore, or the fear, or anything that really has to do with the actual plot. But, because the characters are so loveable, and so, so real, that you fall in love with them and their friendship almost immediately. As soon as it is formed, readers feel like they are a part of The Losers’ Club as well. This story is not about clowns, or the shock value. This is a story about childhood, and a story about an epic friendship.
The story opens with Georgie Denbrough, the little brother of one of the main characters Bill Denbrough, losing his paper boat in the sewer during a rainstorm. After that, his body is found with a missing arm, and Georgie is added to the increasingly long list of strange childhood deaths/disappearances in the small town of Derry. Georgie’s brother Bill blames himself for Georgie’s death, because he was the one who made him his paper boat.
From there, Bill and his friends are on a mission to find out what is doing this to their town, and how to stop it. Eddie Kaspbrak and Stanley Uris both recount their own stories of encounters with the monster the kids deem “It,” and while Richie Tozier is still adamant that the monster is not real, he, too, had his own encounter with It. Richie, Bill, Stan, and Eddie meet Mike Hanlon, Beverly Marsh, and Ben Hanscom. Mike shares his knowledge of the monster with the group, and they learn that all seven of them have been faced with this monster in different forms at some point or another. The form they see It in the most throughout the novel is Pennywise the Dancing Clown, but according to the legends, It can take on and become whatever Its victim’s deepest fear is.
At this time, the Loser’s Club also learns that It comes back to terrorize the town every 27 years, and at the end of their first battle with Pennywise, the group takes a blood oath to come back to Derry in 27 years to fight It again. Which brings us to the second part, the adult Loser’s Club coming back to Derry as grownups.
While the story of their fight against the monster is obviously the core of the novel, to me, this is still the story of an epic friendship. In the 27 years between the first encounter with It and the second, the Loser’s Club’s memories of Derry, It, and each other are completely wiped. But when Mike, who stayed behind in Derry while the rest of them moved away and moved on, calls them to tell them It is back, they all pack up from their normal lives to travel back to Derry to face their childhood trauma together, simply because they made a promise to do so. I truly believe that the reason that this book has remained so relevant for so long is because of the attachment that readers form to the characters, as it is a very character driven novel. To sum it up, I will just end with my favorite quote from the book, or maybe any book. “Maybe there aren't any such things as good friends or bad friends - maybe there are just friends, people who stand by you when you're hurt and who help you feel not so lonely. Maybe they're always worth being scared for, and hoping for, and living for. Maybe worth dying for too, if that's what has to be. No good friends. No bad friends. Only people you want, need to be with; people who build their houses in your heart.”
It started with my mom, who read the book her sophomore year of high school in 1995, after the original miniseries came out in 1990. It was a cold fall day in 2017 when I was complaining about how I had not truly read a book since, like, 7th grade. Thirty-two years after the book was published and 24 years after my mom had purchased her copy of the book at the town general store in New Richmond, Ohio, I decided to take on this journey on my own.
The thing about It is that it is the kind of book that sucks you into its story from the beginning, but not because of the gore, or the fear, or anything that really has to do with the actual plot. But, because the characters are so loveable, and so, so real, that you fall in love with them and their friendship almost immediately. As soon as it is formed, readers feel like they are a part of The Losers’ Club as well. This story is not about clowns, or the shock value. This is a story about childhood, and a story about an epic friendship.
The story opens with Georgie Denbrough, the little brother of one of the main characters Bill Denbrough, losing his paper boat in the sewer during a rainstorm. After that, his body is found with a missing arm, and Georgie is added to the increasingly long list of strange childhood deaths/disappearances in the small town of Derry. Georgie’s brother Bill blames himself for Georgie’s death, because he was the one who made him his paper boat.
From there, Bill and his friends are on a mission to find out what is doing this to their town, and how to stop it. Eddie Kaspbrak and Stanley Uris both recount their own stories of encounters with the monster the kids deem “It,” and while Richie Tozier is still adamant that the monster is not real, he, too, had his own encounter with It. Richie, Bill, Stan, and Eddie meet Mike Hanlon, Beverly Marsh, and Ben Hanscom. Mike shares his knowledge of the monster with the group, and they learn that all seven of them have been faced with this monster in different forms at some point or another. The form they see It in the most throughout the novel is Pennywise the Dancing Clown, but according to the legends, It can take on and become whatever Its victim’s deepest fear is.
At this time, the Loser’s Club also learns that It comes back to terrorize the town every 27 years, and at the end of their first battle with Pennywise, the group takes a blood oath to come back to Derry in 27 years to fight It again. Which brings us to the second part, the adult Loser’s Club coming back to Derry as grownups.
While the story of their fight against the monster is obviously the core of the novel, to me, this is still the story of an epic friendship. In the 27 years between the first encounter with It and the second, the Loser’s Club’s memories of Derry, It, and each other are completely wiped. But when Mike, who stayed behind in Derry while the rest of them moved away and moved on, calls them to tell them It is back, they all pack up from their normal lives to travel back to Derry to face their childhood trauma together, simply because they made a promise to do so. I truly believe that the reason that this book has remained so relevant for so long is because of the attachment that readers form to the characters, as it is a very character driven novel. To sum it up, I will just end with my favorite quote from the book, or maybe any book. “Maybe there aren't any such things as good friends or bad friends - maybe there are just friends, people who stand by you when you're hurt and who help you feel not so lonely. Maybe they're always worth being scared for, and hoping for, and living for. Maybe worth dying for too, if that's what has to be. No good friends. No bad friends. Only people you want, need to be with; people who build their houses in your heart.”
