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A review by abigail_lo
It by Stephen King
5.0
First off: I finished it! I don't think the start date is accurate, but that's the first session I logged into Bookly, so we're going with it. What a fucking big book. And probably 1/4 of it wasn't strictly necessary, but whatever.
Second: this won't be a standard book review for two reasons. 1, it's been fucking forever since I wrote a proper review, and I'm half-convinced I've forgotten how to do it. 2, I read this book with so many starts and stops that frankly, I've almost forgotten the first half of it, and I'm sure I can't do it justice. What this will be is a space for me to work out what the fuck my feelings are right now.
So, I just cried unexpectedly for the first time in a long time. Don't get me wrong -- I definitely still cry. I cry when I watch Coco, or sometimes when my parents are being dicks again, but those aren't unexpected. I know why I'm crying, and I know what emotions I'm feeling. This crying? This is new.
Obviously, It is a horror book, and it's damn good horror. I get a kick out of listening to shitty horror stories in pitch dark and laughing at how absurd they are, so it takes quite a bit to rattle me. This shit got me feeling sick to my stomach as I was sitting in my backyard in broad daylight, wrapped in my favorite blanket. But we all knew King was good at horror. What hit me hardest was how the characters came to terms with the demons in their childhood and ultimately moved past them. It probably hit so hard because I just spent a week reminiscing on my parents and how they treated me like shit for the first 15 years of my life, but there was something peaceful about the end. There were so many quotes I wanted to highlight in the last chapter (except I got too caught up in actually reading the book to highlight anything for once), but what's stuck with me now is something Bill said about the childhood versions of ourselves always existing in our memories as the repository for all that we will become in the future.
I think I cried out of anger and sadness, and gratitude and peace. In a weird way, it felt like I was truly grasping for the first time everything I'm leaving behind as I enter adulthood. Not just my parents and what they did, but all the friends who helped me become who I am, whether they only exist in my memories or they're still with me today. It felt like the ending of an era. Perhaps the transition to adulthood should really be marked by when a person finishes reading It.
Unrelated: I firmly believe that King is like Gaiman in that both of their editors need to tamp them the fuck down sometimes. They cannot keep writing some of the shit they do, because it's pretty fucking weird. If you've read the ending of It or the first 30 pages of [b:American Gods|4407|American Gods (American Gods, #1)|Neil Gaiman|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1258417001l/4407._SY75_.jpg|1970226], you know exactly what I'm talking about. It's just ... so much. Men are so strange sometimes, I swear.
tl;dr: Fuck storm drains -- you could not pay me a million dollars to go near one of those now. And while we're at it, fuck clowns. They were always scary, but now they're downright terrifying. Other than that, an incredibly well-crafted (if somewhat odd) book on childhood, memory, and love. I think it'll stay with me for a while.
Second: this won't be a standard book review for two reasons. 1, it's been fucking forever since I wrote a proper review, and I'm half-convinced I've forgotten how to do it. 2, I read this book with so many starts and stops that frankly, I've almost forgotten the first half of it, and I'm sure I can't do it justice. What this will be is a space for me to work out what the fuck my feelings are right now.
So, I just cried unexpectedly for the first time in a long time. Don't get me wrong -- I definitely still cry. I cry when I watch Coco, or sometimes when my parents are being dicks again, but those aren't unexpected. I know why I'm crying, and I know what emotions I'm feeling. This crying? This is new.
Obviously, It is a horror book, and it's damn good horror. I get a kick out of listening to shitty horror stories in pitch dark and laughing at how absurd they are, so it takes quite a bit to rattle me. This shit got me feeling sick to my stomach as I was sitting in my backyard in broad daylight, wrapped in my favorite blanket. But we all knew King was good at horror. What hit me hardest was how the characters came to terms with the demons in their childhood and ultimately moved past them. It probably hit so hard because I just spent a week reminiscing on my parents and how they treated me like shit for the first 15 years of my life, but there was something peaceful about the end. There were so many quotes I wanted to highlight in the last chapter (except I got too caught up in actually reading the book to highlight anything for once), but what's stuck with me now is something Bill said about the childhood versions of ourselves always existing in our memories as the repository for all that we will become in the future.
I think I cried out of anger and sadness, and gratitude and peace. In a weird way, it felt like I was truly grasping for the first time everything I'm leaving behind as I enter adulthood. Not just my parents and what they did, but all the friends who helped me become who I am, whether they only exist in my memories or they're still with me today. It felt like the ending of an era. Perhaps the transition to adulthood should really be marked by when a person finishes reading It.
Unrelated: I firmly believe that King is like Gaiman in that both of their editors need to tamp them the fuck down sometimes. They cannot keep writing some of the shit they do, because it's pretty fucking weird. If you've read the ending of It or the first 30 pages of [b:American Gods|4407|American Gods (American Gods, #1)|Neil Gaiman|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1258417001l/4407._SY75_.jpg|1970226], you know exactly what I'm talking about. It's just ... so much. Men are so strange sometimes, I swear.
tl;dr: Fuck storm drains -- you could not pay me a million dollars to go near one of those now. And while we're at it, fuck clowns. They were always scary, but now they're downright terrifying. Other than that, an incredibly well-crafted (if somewhat odd) book on childhood, memory, and love. I think it'll stay with me for a while.