"It" Book Club! discussion

I keep meaning to answer these and then forgetting. Haha.

1) I don't think Fur Elise plays any real significance in the story, but it could be that King chose the song because it held some kind of significance for him.

2) I think After The Flood is told out of chronological order so that we can jump right into the action. We wouldn't get that incredible opening line if the book started with Bill making the boat. In After The Festival King uses the police interviews as a framing device to illustrate the way the powers that be in Derry turn a blind eye to the evil in their midst. We also get more context for Adrian's murder, including a very sympathetic depiction of Derry's gay community and Don's grief.

3) King totally nails it. Especially the part about looking away while you lean in to flick the light switch on.

5) Good!

Ronnie wrote: "Hey y’all! Happy Saturday! 🌞

How are we all doing? Did we all enjoy the first week of reading? We’ve got some topics down below that we’ve compiled for chapters 1 and 2:

1.) What do y’all think ..."

1-Until this question I hadn't given much thought to the significance of Mrs. Denbrough's playing of Fur Elise. I'm not sure if I made this up but it seemed like she was maybe a piano teacher or did lessons to some degree. I think Fur Elise is well known for being in early piano lessons, but perhaps she was playing just because she enjoyed it? It's inferred from the movie (and maybe the book too) that after Georgie dies, she never plays again.

2-King is obviously a master storyteller and he knew what he was doing when he wrote the order of the book. It seems he is known for foreshadowing some terrible event...building up the psychological fear and dread. I think the way the story jumps around in the beginning is used mostly to build of the fear of the book, to let the reader's dread build. It also shows how much dark and evil is in Derry.

3- The basement scene is pretty much all of us in our youth. I grew up in a huge, old farm house in Iowa. I was the youngest by far and by the time I was 12, most of my siblings were all out of the house. I was a "latch key kid" and spent a few hours after school, home alone before my parents came home. I often had to go in the basement to tend to the coal room (it's definitely as creepy as it sounds) or do the laundry, or tend to the cat food and litter box. Even though I could flip on a light at the top of the stairs and I had been down there a 100 times where nothing happened, as a kid, all you can think about is the POSSIBILITY of something being down there. And if you didn't run up the stairs as fast as you could, were you even a kid? lol

4- Since this is re-read number ? for me, I'll just mention the good ol' Chambray shirt that King of course has to mention in every book :)

I had a decent week, super hot and humid here in Wisconsin and so many mosquito's it could literally become the topic of a new King short story. Hoping for cooler weather soon so I can walk my dog. Hope the rest of you are staying cool and safe!