Haunted by Stephen King's It (Part 1)

*Disclaimer  I am still learning so I know editing and sound quality is a little rough please bear with me!* This week I am Haunted by Stephen King's It due to the length of the book it was be a 2 part episode. Please enjoy episode 1! Trigger warnings are giving at the top of the episode. 

Transcript

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Welcome to Haunted Reader. I'm Elizabeth. Each week I'll sit down and I'll tell you what book is haunting me. I'll give an in-depth summary of the book and then I'll share a few of my thoughts after. I mostly read horror and thriller books, but occasionally I'll throw in some fantasy and young adult books as well. This week's book I'm Haunted by is Stephen King's It. My reading goal this year is to read as many Stephen King books as I can. So my plan is to do three Stephen King books and then do three non-Stephen King books and repeat for the rest of the year. This episode will probably end up being a two-parter due to the length of this book. So before we get into this one, let me give you guys some of the warnings. Uh we got violence, abuse, sexual abuse, we have the death of an animal. And honestly, there's probably a few more that I'm forgetting. So now let's get into this book. It opens in the town of Derry Maine, dwelling a young Georgie Dunbrough chasing a newspaper boat made by his brother, who the other kids sometimes call stuttering Bill. He's home with the flu. And just for a little bit of extra context in the situation, Georgie is six at this time, and Bill is ten. It follows the process of Bill creating this boat for Georgie and how afraid Georgie was going into the basement for the paraffin wax that was needed for the boat. The scene also sets up a bit of foreshadowing. When they mention Georgie is mesmerized by a can of wax with a picture of a turtle on it. The turtle is what would be the foreshadowing here. After the boat is finished, Georgie kisses Bill on the cheek and runs out the door. Little does he know, this is where Bill starts living in a world of terror. Georgie follows his boat down the street till it falls into a storm drain, where our good friend Pennywise enters the picture. In the book, Pennywise is described in a quote as an a crash between Bozo and Claribel on Howdy Duty. The face was white, there was funny tufts of hair on either side of his head, and a big red clown smile painted over his mouth. While holding Georgie's boat, Pennywise tries to convince Georgie that they are friends now and to come down to see the circus. And where this is where we will get the famous line, and you'll float too. Georgie is eventually convinced and reaches his arm in for his boat, which is when he sees Pennywise change and proceed to rip off Georgie's arm. After hearing Georgie screams, a neighbor finds him and carries his body to Georgie's house. One thing I enjoyed in this book is that the chapters went between past, which was 1957, and present, which was 1984. In chapter two, we are in 1984. Following a young gay couple and the investigation into one of their murders. Couple was attacked by a group of homophobes who police believed at the time were also their murderers. But after the investigation with everyone that was involved, it is clear that Pennywise has returned. And after Adrian, the murdered boyfriend, is pushed from the bridge by his attackers, Pennywise strikes and kills him. Here is also where we find out what Pennywise is wearing. He wore a baggy suit with a big orange pom-pom buttons. On his hands were big cartoon gloves. A year after the murder of Adrian, we meet the adult version of The Loser's Club. As the time has come for Mike Hannon to make the calls to bring them back to Derry. First is Stanley Uris. Stanley grew up to become a successful accountant and living with his wife in Atlanta. One thing Stanley would randomly remember is the same foreshadowing as Georgie, the turtle. The only thing Stanley would remember is the phrase, the turtle couldn't help us. After his phone call with Mike, Stanley told his wife he was going up to take a bath. After realizing he was gone for a rather long time, Stanley's wife went up to the bathroom only to find the door was locked. Once she was able to finally find the key, she found Stanley inside. He had taken his own life with a razor blade, leaving only one word on the wall in blood. It. The next call was to Richie Trashmouth Tozer. I'm gonna be honest, I'm not sure if that's how you pronounce it. So bear with me for the rest of this. Who was living alone in LA as a successful radio personality with multiple voice talents? One thing Richie remembered of his childhood was that the Loser Club's bullies were Henry Bowers, Victor Chris, and Bill Chickens. After his phone call from Mike, he made his travel arrangements to get back to Derry. The third call was to my personal favorite, Ben Hanscombe. Ben was living alone as a successful architect in Hemingford home. One thing Ben remembered from his childhood was silver coins left by his dad. He remembered there were four, but he couldn't remember what they used the fourth one for. After his call from Mike, he took the other three to his favorite bartender for his kids. Then Ben Laffordary. The fourth call was to Eddie Kasbrack. Eddie lived with his wife, who was very much like his mother in New York. Eddie owned a very successful limo company. The one thing Eddie remembered of his childhood was people telling him and his mother his asthma wasn't real and it was in his mother's head. All of the fear that his mother had had for his health is one of the things that Eddie remembered most. After his call from Mike, he also left for Derry. The fifth call was to Beverly Rogan, formerly known as Beverly March. Bev was living in Chicago with her very abusive husband, who was like her father. The one thing Bev remembered from her childhood was that her and Bill had a strong connection. After her call from Mike, Bev and her husband get into an extremely violent fight. Bev ends up fleeing with only her suitcase, and she has no shoes or money with her, but she leaves and she's trying to find her way to get to Derry. The last call is to Bill Dunbrough, also known as stuttering Bill. Bill is temporarily living in England with his wife and it is a very successful author. The thing Bill remembers from his childhood is that Georgie was murdered and his stutter begins to return. After his call with Mike, he also leaves for dairy. Here we have our first interlude, which is told by Mike as he researches into the strangeness that is dairy and it. Mike explains a part of him feels like it had been awoken in him in 1980. That made him begin research. He was still in dairy as the watchman for it. Bill referred to this part in Mike as the voice of the turtle. Working in the local library, Mike begins to search for what is feeding on dairy. In his research, he learns it attacks about every 27 years, starting in 1876 and 1877, and in 1904 to 1906 until the Kitchener Iron Work exploded, again in 1929 to 1930, until the black spot burned down, and in 1957 to 1958, until the Losers Club tried to end it. Mike is torn after the murder of Adrian to call them back because he doesn't want to call them back until he's positive that it has returned. After the interlude, we return to 1958. It is the last day of school, and we meet young Ben and Bev as they are waiting to be dismissed. After being dismissed and trying to leave quickly before Henry Bowers is dismissed, Ben is leaving when Bev stops to tell him to have a good summer, and here we find out that Ben has a crush on Bev as he watches her leave. Ben snaps back into it and realizes he needs to leave before Henry comes out. As he makes it to the library, he's unaware that Henry, Victor, and Belch are all waiting for him to leave the library. In the library, Ben writes the postcard to Bev saying, Your hair is winter fire, January embers, my heart burns there too. As Ben leaves the library to mail the postcard to Bev, Henry, Victor, and Belch begin to follow him. Once they catch him, Henry has Victor and Belch hold his arms as he cuts an H into Ben's stomach for not letting him copy a final exam, causing Henry to have to return to school for summer school this summer. As Henry is attacking Ben, he finds the strength to push backwards and go over the side into the barrens. After tumbling down, he realizes that Henry and the boys have followed him down. Henry catches up to him, and in a moment of bravery, Ben kicks him in the balls and he falls over. Victor and Belch begin to throw rocks at him and he takes off. As he is running, there is a moment of foreshadowing here as he passes the sewer drain and says he gets a weird chill. He then finds a spot to hide and falls asleep. When he wakes up, he hears kids playing and follows the sound, which is how we end up meeting Bill and Eddie. Eddie and Bill were trying to make a dam in the barrens when Henry and company ran into them looking for Ben and break the dam that they were building. On his way over to Bill and Eddie, Ben remembers his first time that he sees it. It was after school, while walking home, he describes seeing a figure dressed in a white silver clown suit with oversized orange shoes and matching pom-pom buttons down the front, holding a bunch of balloons. The figure begins calling Ben and asking him if he wants a balloon. As Ben considers this, the town bell goes off. Ben can finally see the figure's face and it is a mummy. Horrified, Ben realizes it has gotten closer and runs home. As he reaches Bill and Eddie, Bill asks him to stay with Eddie, who is having an asthma attack. Bill gets to his bike that he calls Silver and gets on it to race and get Eddie a new inhaler. Once he gets at his top speed, he yells, Hi ho, Silver, away. He gets to the pharmacy and back in record time. And as he's walking back, he's thinking of Georgie's death and the fact that four other kids have also been killed. When he reaches the boys and he gives Eddie his medicine, they talk and get to know each other for a bit. Bill tells Ben that Richie sometimes comes to the Barons with him as well. Ben tells Bill that he can help them make a new dam and make new plans to go down to the Barons the next day and build it. That night, Bill encounters it for the second time in Georgie's room. While looking through Georgie's old photo album, and just like the first time, he reached Georgie's school picture and Georgie's eyes rolled up and winked at him. When he throws the book, it opens to the same page and blood pours out. The next chapter is about a boy named Eddie C, who was killed by it when it takes the form of the creature from the Black Lagoon. This also sets us up for meeting young Mike Hanlon. Mike, unable to sleep, gets up early and rides his bike to the spot Eddie C was killed the night before. He happens to find a knife with EC on the handle and a turned over bench that had blood. This makes Mike think about the first time. At Kitchener Ironworks, he felt pulled to the cellar hold where inside he found a monster-sized bird whose chest was orange and feathers gray like a giant robin. It chased Mike into an old smokestack where Mike began to throw stones at it, one of which hit the bird directly in the eye. Instead of blood, the eye leaked white gray goo with parasites crawling inside of it. Mike also realized the bird's tongue was silver with orange puffs on it. Mike continued to throw rocks until it flew off. After it left, he decided to run to his bike and go home. After remembering this, Mike decided to throw the knife that he had found into the canal. Later that day in the barons, Bill, Eddie, and Ben were beginning to work on the dam, and Bill let them know Richie and Stan would be joining them at some point in the day. After working on the dam and stopping to eat lunch, Richie and Stan showed up to the barons. The five of them worked together to finish the dam. Once they were done, they were sitting around, hanging out when Eddie got a bad feeling. Bill was about to tell them something that he didn't want to hear. Moments later, Bill told them all about the photo album. This reminds Eddie about his first encounter with it at the house on Neilblot Street. Eddie went there to walk around and look at the trains. And then suddenly there was a hobo whose nostrils were missing, and Eddie believed he had leprosy. The man kept offering Eddie a blowjob for change, stating that his name was Bob Gray. Scared, Eddie ran for his bike and took off, and the man chased after him. He decided to go back weeks later to prove it wasn't real. As he approached the window under the porch, the leper reappeared, only more decayed as he chased Eddie down the street, and Eddie could see a silver suit through the window. Once again, Eddie ran. Eddie told his story after Bill was done telling his. Then Ben told his story about the mummy. Stanley is about to tell his encounter with it when a cop shows up to yell at the boys for building the dam. Ben steps forward to tell Mr. Neil, the officer who stopped, to take the blame and put it on Ben. But all the boys begin to fess up as well. Mr. Nell tells them they aren't in trouble but to take it down and if they play in the barrens, to never play alone. After taking it down, the boys leave, and Richie and Bill decide to walk home together. Richie ends up asking Bill if he can come over to see the photo album, and Bill agrees. While looking at the photo album, an old picture of Derry begins to move with the two boys in it that look like Richie and Bill. As the picture moves, they could hear even hear the sound of the cars and the pictures. Richie points to the canal and in the photo the boys turn and look. Pennywise pops up wearing Georgie's face with his hair slicked back and grease paint on and black holes for eyes. Pennywise tries to grab the picture Bill by the throat. And as he does this, the real Bill tries to reach his fingers into the photo. As he reaches the tips of his fingers through the photo, Richie pulls his hand out. Bill's fingers are covered in tiny cuts. When they look back, the photo is normal again. They then realize Pennywise is killing the kids in dairy, and a few days later, Richie and Ben go to the movies, and on their way, they run into a young Beverly and invite her to go with them. After they watched, I was a teenage werewolf. The three of them had to sneak out of the movie theater to avoid Henry and his boys, only to find out that they were waiting for them outside anyway. The two groups fought, and after they win, Richie dubs them the Losers Club. We also get another famous line here when Bev is trying to get Richie to stop messing around and says Richie beep beep, which in the movie becomes beep beep Richie. After this, they take Bev to see the Barons. They run into Bill who is with another boy named Bradley. Bill's face tells Richie that Bev is part of their group now, but Bradley is not. This is where they first get the sense that they are being chosen for something. Five days later, Bill tells Richie he wants to check out the house on Neilbot Street. It took some convincing, and after agreeing to get his father's gun, Bill gets Richie to go with him the next day. Armed with Bill's dad's gun and a slingshot, and Richie is armed with sneezing powder, they ride Silver down to Neilbot Street. They enter the house from the window under the porch. While in the cellar, they heard the loud bangs of a door opening and some snarling sounds. Richie then saw the werewolf from I Was a Teenage Werewolf coming down the stairs. The boys climbed the call banks to get out, and Bill fired the gun three times in powder. While it was sneezing, they finally make it outside. Outside, running to silver, Richie says that the wolf was wearing what looked like a black and white jacket, and it had orange pom-poms instead of a zipper, and the name Richie Tojer on it in orange. And Bill looks back and he sees a clown, not a werewolf. Here we flash to how Bev gets help from her friend Kay after escaping her husband to get to Dairy. She was in her bathroom and she could hear voices in the sink drain and a really bad smell coming from it. After talking to the voices, she realizes the voices that she's hearing are the children who have been killed. Then the voice of Pennywise comes through, telling her he will get them all, and a fountain of blood comes up from the sink. She screams and her dad rushes in, and she realizes that he can't see the blood. The next day her and her mother clean the the entire house after her mother left for work. She went to play with the boys, except for Bill, who was busy. She ended up telling them what happened, and they asked to go see what happened. They helped her clean it, and while at the laundromat cleaning the towels they used to wipe the blood, all the boys tell their stories about seeing it. And this time Stanley gets to tell his story. Tells them he was at the standpipe bird watching when he was started hearing a loud bang sound. He realized it was coming from the standpipe and went to look and assumed it was the door, but it was closed. He investigated the door and found a destroyed padlock and went inside to see what was going on. While inside he began to hear carnival music. Walking up the steps he could hear footsteps and see shadows. He realized the shadows didn't look right and began to run. He was unable to get back out the door. He called who's there and heard someone say the dead ones. In a panic, Stanley closed his eyes and pulled out his bird watching book and began to yell out the bird name. As he did this, the door slowly began to open and he fell out. And when he fell out, he saw two drowned boys at the end of their fingers. They had orange pom-poms. He decided to get up and run home. Now here we've reached our second interlude. I need to backtrack a moment here. I forgot to mention that in the first interlude, Mike explains about how the cycle ending with the disaster at the Kitchener Ironworks during an Easter egg hunt. This one he explains how the cycle that ends with the fire at the black spot and how he still wasn't sure he should make the calls when Pennywise left him a balloon with his face on it, with no eyes and blood on it. As he screamed, the balloon exploded. Now we have reached the second interlude, but I need to back up for a moment to the first interlude. In the first interlude, Mike explains that the cyc that cycle had ended with the disaster at the Kitchener Ironworks, which took place during an Easter egg hunt. This cycle, he explains, it ended with a fire at the black spot and how he still wasn't sure if he should make the calls when Pennywise left a balloon in the library for him with the picture of his face on it and no eyes and blood on it. As he screamed, the balloon exploded. Now we are back into 1984, where the Losers Club has met as adults for the first time. They all make plans to meet at a Chinese restaurant. When Bill arrives, he learns that everyone else has already arrived. They catch up a little bit and eat and make comments about Richie no longer wearing glasses and how Ben is now thin. Anne and Mike informs them he died after he had made the phone calls, and Bev realizes that Stan had took his own life. They all agreed he did not want to face it. Mike informs them he had been keeping tabs on them over the years and how the murders started again. He tells them everything that has happened so far and all the things he found in his research. Mike also shows them a picture from a crime scene where the words come home was written three times in blood. He also explains how he believes it makes the adults look away from everything happening or how they don't do anything to help anyone on purpose. And he explains how some people are just leaving dairy altogether. Another thing he points out is how they all, with the exception of him, went on to be successful, and also the fact that none of them are able to have children. They all explain they had no memory of their childhood in dairy until Mike called and the pieces were suddenly starting to click together. But some of their memories were still missing, and especially the ones about how they fought it. They all agree to stay and kill it this time. Mike tells them they should go around to walk on their own and get any memories back if they can. They all agree and say they will meet up at the library later, but before they go, they each pick up a fortune cookie. Each fortune cookie took on the form of a whore. Bev's had blood, Eddie's had become a bug, Richie's and I, Ben's bloody teeth, Bill's a grotesque fly. Mike isn't mentioned as to what his fortune cookie had become. After this, they all leave the restaurant. Ben gets out at uphill mile. Ben starts to remember that Bev had somehow saved his life with the silver dollar, and he remembered the word chud, but couldn't remember what it meant. He realizes he's wandered to the library. He sees the signs for curfew that remind him of his childhood and decides to get a new library card. While waiting, Pennywise appears and begins yelling. Ben hides in a book aisle, and Pennywise is trying to convince him to leave. After reading of Ben's thoughts, their plan to kill him. And also realizing that only Ben can see and hear it. He also remembers that they made slugs out of the silver dollars. He looks up and sees a balloon that says, Tonight you die. He leaves with the book he just grabbed at random and realizes it's the book he had when Henry had attacked him and cut the H into his stomach. Eddie took the bus to Cotlix Lane. He wanders to truck depot. He remembers kids used to play baseball in the back, that Belch had played baseball. There a lot, and once hit the ball over the fence into the barrens. Looking into the barrens, he sees what Ben called a Moorlock hole and remembers that they went into one to face it that day. And that Patrick Hostetter was down there, and Bev had seen Patrick do something with Henry. While remembering this, Eddie sees it in the form of Belch, who died in the sewers the day they went down there. While running away, the old bases fly out of the air at him as something moves under the ground towards him. Out popped it as appearing as the man who owned the deep pot, who was dead and changed forms into other dead people Eddie knew. He ran until he collapsed, walked down Main Street, and was remembering the postcard with the poem on it, and how she had had to hide it from her parents, and how she had believed her entire life that it was from Bill because she had crush on him. She vaguely remembered that Bill Ben may have said that he had wrote it, and that there was a chance she had told Bill that she loved him, and that the confessions may have saved their lives. She was walking and she realized she walked back to her old house. Here she runs into an older woman who now owns it, Mrs. Kersh, and Mrs. Kirsch tells Bev her father had passed on and offered to make her tea. When they sit down to have tea, Bev notices Mrs. Kersh's teeth have changed from white to yellow. Mrs. Kirsch begins to change into a decaying old woman and mentions how her father was Bob Grey, known as Pennywise the Dancing Clown. Bev realizes the tear tea had turned to shit and the kitchen was made of candy as she gets up to run. It goes from the form of Hansel and Gretel to the form of Bev's father and follows her down the hall. Then as she reached outside, it took the form of Pennywise. Once Bev is across the street, she realizes the house was abandoned the entire time. Attached to that house property that says that's right, Rabbit on it. Richie walks up Canal Street by Basie Park and for the second time since arriving in Derry gets a sharp pain in his eyes. He's beginning to remember his first real encounter with it when it happens, but the pain reminds him of smoke and has a faint memory of him and Mike doing something that involved smoke or fire. He reaches Basie Park and looks at the Paul Bunyan statue. While looking at it, he remembers a time he was running from Henry and the boys and lost them inside a toy store. After losing them, he made his way to the park where he had his first real encounter with it that he believed was a dream while looking at a concert announcement. But present-day Richie looks over and sees a new concert announced, the Paul Bunyan statue. Paul remembers the whole encounter from when he was young and Pennywise took the form of Paul Bunyan's statue, and he had swung his axe at him. Richie realizing it wasn't a dream and scrambling away once far enough, he looked back and saw it was a statue again. Present day Richie Richie's eyes begins to burn so bad he has to take out his contacts. He looks at the concert announcement again before leaving and see it has changed to say that they are going to have a concert to honor Richie's return to Derry with all dead musicians. And at the bottom it says, Welcome home, Richie, you're dead too. He turns around and sees the statue had turned into Pennywise. They exchange threats before Richie uses a fake voice and it flinches slightly and Richie runs. Bill walked up Wicham and looks into the drain where Georgie was killed and runs into a young boy who tells him that he's heard voices in his bath drain and how he was friends with one of the new victims. They part ways and Bill wanders and finds himself at a thrift store where in the window he sees silver. He goes in and remembers an old saying, he thrust his fist against the post and still insists he sees the ghost, and can't think of why he's remembering that. He asks to buy the bike, then uses the phone to call Mike to see if he could put it in his garage, and left with the bike. Mike waits for Bill and together they work on silver. Bill asks Mike how he had everything that they needed, and Mike tells him that he had a feeling he was just gonna need the stuff the week before while he was in the store. Then Mike hands Bill a deck of playing cards for the wheels, and Bill drops them. Two aces fall out face up, and Mike doesn't understand how that's possible since he had just opened the deck. One of the cards on the back is blue and the other one is red. Bill states he feels everything is predetermined, and he is supposed to put them on they go in to have dinner. Bill asks Mike if he knows the phrase he remembered, and Mike tells him that Bill's mother taught it to him to help him with his stutter. This brings us to three characters, not in the Losers Club, but also important. First is Henry Bowers, who is currently in Juniper Hills, since he was the only one besides the losers to survive the sewers in 1958 and the killing of his father and convicted of all the killings that happened that year. While in Juniper, Henry hears voices coming from the moon. First was Victor's, and then Belch telling Henry the losers were back in Derry. Then he begins hearing more voices tormenting him. Henry hears Victor under his bed. Victor helps Henry escape when it, as Victor, turns into a clown with the head of a doberman pincher and attacks the guard. Next is Tom, Bev's abusive husband. Still angry, Bev attacked him and won, and also took off. He goes to Kay's house, who helped Bev leave, and beats her until she tells him where Bev went to. After giving Tom the information and he leaves, Kay gets checked at the hospital and then tries to call the Derry Townhouse to try and warn Bev, who doesn't answer, so she leaves a message. Tom arrives in Maine and removes a license plate from a car to put on a truck he bought and drives into Derry. Last is Audra, Bill's wife, who leaves to follow Bill in fear of his safety. She lands in Maine, rents a car, and drives to Derry. As fate would have it, her and Tom stay in lodging next door to each other and also park their cars directly across from each other. Henry hitchhiked his way to Derry. This brings us to the third interlude in which Mike talks about the cycle that ended in the 1930s, but may have started with the Bradley gang murders in 1929. After the interlude, we go back to 1987 to meet up in the library. Bill arrives first and remembers when him and the boys were hanging out and talking about Henry and bullying, not realizing they would soon meet the boy Henry hated the most, Mike. Henry hated Mike most because Mike's father had issues with Henry, starting when Mike's dad sued Henry's father for killing the Hanland chickens. After hearing all the Bowers' issues were due to the Hanlons, Henry hated Mike so much he poisoned Mike's dog. Henry went to a different school, which is why he didn't know the Loser's Club at first. One day when leaving his house, he didn't realize he was being followed by Henry, Belch, Victor, and a boy named Moose. They chased him down to the Barrens, where Bill was informing the other kids that he believed it lived in the sewers. Bill also says he went to the library to research and believes it is called a glamour, and they can do a ritual known as Chud to kill it. Chud is when you have to bite into each other's tongues, and if the human laughs first, he dies. If the monster laughs, it goes away for 100 years. After they discussed it, they got up to shoot off fireworks and the dump and the barrens. Seeing the employee for the dump was still there, they kept walking. Mike was chased into the train yard where Henry began throwing cherry bombs at him, and Henry confessed he killed Mike's dog. Mike ran and found coal and started throwing it at them. Once they were on the move again, Mike and Mike ran and jumped the fence into the barrens, and Henry began throwing M eighties at him and in a different spot could hear the M eighties. Bill tells the others to go grab rocks. By instinct, Richie removes his glasses. As they all grab rocks, Mike sees them and runs towards them asking for help and thought it was odd. They looked like they were all waiting for him. Here they have an epic rock fight that causes Henry and the others to retreat. After this, Mike is officially becomes part of the Loser Club. And here is where we're going to stop for part one of it. Please, if you have a moment, please rate and review the podcast. And if you can, follow me on Instagram at A Haunted Reader Podcast. I'm also working on creating a YouTube channel and as well as a TikTok. If you have any book recs, please send them to a haunted reader at gmail.com. And until next Wednesday and part two of it, stay spooky and keep reading. Bye.