I forget who first turned me on to the Sawbones podcast (I feel like it was Science...Sort of). I love science-y facts and I especially love medical science-y facts. This is also the reason why I love Mary Roach's books so much as well. Give me medical history facts and I can annoy friends and family for DAYS.
So while I listen to the podcast on a regular basis and I knew they had a book, I still had not purchased said book until a very important event came up in my life. I volunteer and raise money every year (for the last 12 years!) for the Crohn's and Colitis Foundation and normally I'm out and about hosting trivia nights, dine to donates, etc to raise the money. This year, good ol' COVID put a stop to that. The Foundation was in a pickle. If we didn't raise the funds, medication and research trials would have to stop.
I decided to do a Zoom trivia night to raise money. But what to do? People already did some fun ones, like 80s, sports, etc.
I know! Weird Medical Trivia!
I quickly ordered the Sawbones book and got to reading. WOW. This is seriously my kind of book. I could not stop texting friends and family with "DID YOU KNOW...." texts. They were getting to where they just ignored me.
Trivia night went really well. I centered a bit around poop - I mean, we're all about the digestive diseases here - and I think people had a great time. I structured the questions in a way to be easy enough to let people gain some points as well as being informative and gross. My friends and family got to learn about the Urine Flavor Wheel and drinking diarrhea as a test for cholera. They were impressed and disgusted. I raised money. My job was done.
Justin and Sydnee McElroy are the hosts. Sydnee is a doctor and great at researching! Justin is hilarious and always has the right thing to say.
That being said, I thoroughly enjoyed the book and highly recommend it!
This is my second time reading IT by Stephen King. The first time was roughly 8th-9th grade, lugging this gigantic 1,000+ page book around to my classrooms. When my tests/homework were done, I pulled IT out and thunked it down on my desk and started reading. (No, I wasn't popular. Why do you ask?)
The second time through was in the last several months but I listened to it via Audible, with the intent of listening to the 44 hour behemoth on my work commute. Until I was no longer allowed to commute. (Thanks COVID). Finding time at home to listen to 44 hours of Steven Weber 1000% throwing himself into the screaming and chaos of the story was rough. But once it really started rolling, I couldn't stop listening.
So there will be spoilers here, because really, this book came out in 1986, Tim Curry already graced us as Pennywise in 1990 and we have 2 more modern movies. You should have read this by now. Speaking of, do listen to Overdue Podcast's very pared down take of IT. It's hard to cover this book in such a short space.
Also, if you've seen the movies, do not brush your hands together and feel you read the book too. Not even close, bucko. We'd need at least 7 movies to cover everything in the book.
Onward.
I believe everyone knows the basic premise. Pennywise the clown terrorizes the town of Derry, Maine. Basically, he eats children. He comes around every 20 some years after resting from his feasts. In 1957 to 1958, he terrorizes the wrong children. We meet Georgie Denbrough when he chases his little paper boat down to a storm drain. He meets his grisly fate when he reaches into the grate to get his boat from Pennywise. His older brother, Bill, or Big Bill, blames himself for Georgie's death. Bill's friends, Eddie, Richie, and Stan, and later, Ben, Bev, and Mike, all experience some sort of encounter with IT, in some form. Wanting to avenge Georgie's death, they, The Loser's Club, come up with a plan to kill IT.
There are many, many, many paths to the culmination of said plan. Honestly, I think it's a great ride, so don't skimp out. Get to know the kids because soon we meet them as adults. Also, toss all your hatred at Henry and his fellow bullies. What assholes.
In 1984 to 1985, Mike is the lone Loser who remained in Derry. His job as librarian allows him to keep watch for when/if IT rises again. The Losers thought they had killed IT back in the 50's but there was a little bit of doubt left that made Mike stay. Unfortunately, he was right. IT comes back and starts feasting on the town's children. Lest you think IT just eats and leaves, you'd be wrong. IT has a terrible habit of turning people's minds, evil people do his bidding, decent people turn a blind eye to the violence happening right in front of them. IT is pure evil and Derry is its home.
Mike calls back all of the Losers because they made a vow to return if IT really wasn't dead. All but Stan return (RIP Stan) and, as they get to Derry, they start to remember everything they've forgotten. Their memories were so buried they even forgot each other.
The adult Losers go into battle once again and fully defeat IT (or do they?), but they lose Eddie in the process. Mike is seriously hurt and they are just down to a few Losers. Things do get a little weird with the Turtle and all but, still, stick with it. Because, near the end, is the punch that got me. Again.
I remembered that this book really bothered me when I first read it. No, it wasn't the clown, the deaths, the violence. It was the memories. Or the lack thereof. As the Losers got older, their memories of Derry and of their best friends were essentially wiped out. You know, memories fade as you get older. You don't always remember what it was like when you were 12. But there usually is something there. In the case of the adults, nothing was there. Bill had even forgotten Georgie, such is the magic of Derry.
When the adult Losers battled IT, we lost Eddie. Valiant Eddie, rushing in with his asthma inhaler to save his friends. Losing an arm in the giant spider's mouth (it will make sense, just read the book) and dying, surrounded by his friends.
Who promptly forget him once IT is defeated and they move on to their regular lives. "Eddie, was it migraines or asthma he had? What was his last name again?" It's not the Loser's fault, it's the magic of the town but that was the part that punched me hard in middle school and again as an 40-something.
I believe that people don't leave us as long as they are in our memories. It's been the one thing I cling to when trying to work through grief in my life. So Eddie being so forgotten, made non-existent, broke my heart. Giving his life to save theirs didn't register to them. To them, it never happened. His body was left down in IT's sewers and Eddie, just....didn't exist.
That might be my worst fear. Dying and being completely forgotten.
IT is well worth the time to devour. Some little paths lead nowhere, a la King, but overall it's a really great story of childhood, best friends and child-eating clowns.
Before We Were Yours by Lisa Wingate was not what I expected. Honestly, every time I think I've "met" the most horrible person, the world introduces me to another much worse. C'mon world...is that necessary?
Thankfully, in this case, we're also introduced to someone on the other end of the spectrum. But the world is still cruel. In this novel, the evil, horrible person is real. The good person is not.
Rill Foss and her family, Dad Briny, Mom Queenie, and siblings live on the river in a shanty boat. It's a terrible night when Queenie is giving birth, only to discover she's having twins and something is terribly wrong. Out of desperation, Briny takes Queenie to the hospital and tells Rill to watch over the kids. He'll be back soon.
The only person coming to the boat for Rill and her siblings is Georgia Tann (click that link, woman is EVIL), and she's there to take all of the kids to an orphanage. Filling their heads with lies about seeing their parents real soon, she gets them in the car and takes them far from their home. Rill tries to keep the kids calm, with her own promises of seeing Briny and Queenie soon. But they land in a place of unspeakable horror. I know that phrase is overused, but it's true in this situation.
Kids are abused, tortured, raped, and sold to the highest bidder. And Tann profits off all of them. Rill's family is broken up, either through adoption or death, until it's just Rill and Fern.
In between Rill's story, we are in mostly present day with Avery Stafford, a wealthy lawyer who is the favorite daughter of Wells Stafford (these names, for real), an influential Southern Senator. How are they remotely related to Rill's story? Damn good question that took some time to answer.
Avery really didn't interest me, honestly, none of the Staffords did. Wealthy people who suddenly decided NOT to marry for influence and to march to their own (wealthy) drum usually bore me to tears. Avery is interesting in that she is the catalyst that pulls past and present together. We don't dive deep into the Staffords and for that, I am thankful.
Rill and her life, however, is horrifying and intriguing, made worse knowing it's based on facts.
I'm so very behind in reading the books sent to me from Nowhere Bookshop for the Fantastic Strangelings book club. Not because the books are not good, they truly are, but so are so many other books calling my name!
I signed up for the Nowhere Bookshop event where Jenny Lawson and Samantha Irby talk about Irby's new book, wow, no thank you, and just about weird things in general. It was a fun/funny event!
Irby's latest book is a series of essays so it's super simple to read one and go do dishes. Read one on your lunch then go back to work. And they are hysterical! At first, I did wonder why there was so much about poop and Irby's digestive system and I remembered before I read it, she has Crohn's Disease. I had Ulcerative Colitis, a sibling of Crohn's, and yeah, I still make a lot of poop jokes and I talk about my guts and jacked up body a lot too. I'm just not nearly as funny.
I had previously read Irby's other book We Are Never Meeting In Real Life, and again, hysterical. She brought up her first book, Meaty, in one of the essays and I feel like, yeah, I'm reading her backwards, but I'll have to read Meaty too.
While I would recommend reading all of the essays in wow, no thank you, I have to say Country Crock and A Guide to Simple Home Repairs made me laugh hard if only because I get it. Country living in a Republican state can be....different. And having your first house with all the things that can go wrong...and still go wrong... is funny when it's someone else dealing with it.
“The closer I creep toward the precipice of forty, the more time I spend listening to the same songs I listened to in high school and combing through surprisingly vivid memories of my time there, which is wild, because I did not actually have a good time being young!”
Good stuff. Perfect for, well, right about now! Get a copy!
