IT

Seven friends in Derry, Maine make a promise as children and come back as adults to keep it, facing something that has fed on the town for generations. IT runs on two timelines at once, alternating between a 1950s childhood and the grown-up lives those children later made, so that memory itself becomes part of the horror. Stephen King gives each member of the group a full interior life, and the book spends as much attention on bullying, neglect and loyalty as on the shapeshifting presence beneath the streets. Its length allows Derry to be drawn in unusual depth. Who it suits and why: • Dual timelines that braid a 1950s childhood with an adult return • An ensemble of seven characters each given real interior history • Derry drawn as a town with its own long record of violence • A shapeshifting antagonist that takes the shape of private fear A long, immersive read for committed horror readers, published by Hodder Books and offered at Boipoka.