Pages 1 - 11 Summary

Twelve year-old Douglas Spaulding is jubilant, as he awakes on the first day of summer in 1928. From his grandparents' three-story boarding house, where he spends one night a week, he watches the citizens of Green Town, Illinois stir to life at dusk as if timed to his imaginary orchestration. He knows this day will be special, when he passes through a spider web and breaks it with his face. Later, Father takes Douglas and his younger brother Tom to a forest to collect fox grapes and wild strawberries. While Father speaks in mysterious ways about the wonders of nature, Douglas feels as if something is approaching them. It's not a dangerous Thing, but certainly immense and strange. Contemplating such thoughts, Tom jumps on Douglas for a fight, which is when the Thing finally encroaches. It is Douglas' realization that he is...