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A review by dembury
Devolution: A Firsthand Account of the Rainier Sasquatch Massacre by Max Brooks
1.0
Well that was disappointing. I was really excited about the prospect of a Bigfoot horror/survival story, but "Devolution" didn't deliver. Half of this book is Brooks preaching about people's lack of survival skills, reliance on electronics, lack of natural disaster preparedness, and a whole host of other topics, and it's funny because I actually agree with him on many on these points, but the incessant harping about all these things got SO TEDIOUS. I probably sound like one of the people Brooks was narrating against, but it got to the moment where all I was thinking was, "Can we PLEASE just stop being serious and get back to the story?! " Yeah, he made some great points, but in doing so he sacrificed a lot of plot development.
The other half of the story is predictable and substitutes blood and gore in place of real terror. Sure, I had a chill here and there, but it was the same chill you get from watching a C-list horror movie knowing from the increasingly spooky music that some dude in a mask is about to jump out of a closet. Also, there was nothing new offered to the Bigfoot legend, or even anything that was new, period. It was, again, like a subpar movie, although now it's one of those survival ones where a wizened old scientist quips, "Humans took over Mother Nature...now Mother Nature is taking back what belongs to her!" I could have only read the first and last chapters of this book and then told you with 90% accuracy what happens, who dies, and what the climax of the book looks like. I went into this book prepared to enjoy every second of the Bigfoot-ness, but even as I was trying to force myself to like it I just couldn't: as the story went on it just devolved (lol) into a hot mess of predictable tropes and plot points, unlikeable characters, and dry dialogue.
There are other numerous little things I don't think were well done (the main character, Katie, is annoying as HELL; the Bigfoot for some reason speak a vaguely defined "American folk language" that SOMEHOW another character speaks, too; a bunch of really unnecessary footnotes) but I'm just leaving it here.
Can someone PLEASE write some good cryptid novels?! Cause this ain't it.
TL;DR "Devolution" is basically just the "Jurassic Park" movie but with Bigfoot. Spielberg=1, Brooks=0.
The other half of the story is predictable and substitutes blood and gore in place of real terror. Sure, I had a chill here and there, but it was the same chill you get from watching a C-list horror movie knowing from the increasingly spooky music that some dude in a mask is about to jump out of a closet. Also, there was nothing new offered to the Bigfoot legend, or even anything that was new, period. It was, again, like a subpar movie, although now it's one of those survival ones where a wizened old scientist quips, "Humans took over Mother Nature...now Mother Nature is taking back what belongs to her!" I could have only read the first and last chapters of this book and then told you with 90% accuracy what happens, who dies, and what the climax of the book looks like. I went into this book prepared to enjoy every second of the Bigfoot-ness, but even as I was trying to force myself to like it I just couldn't: as the story went on it just devolved (lol) into a hot mess of predictable tropes and plot points, unlikeable characters, and dry dialogue.
There are other numerous little things I don't think were well done (the main character, Katie, is annoying as HELL; the Bigfoot for some reason speak a vaguely defined "American folk language" that SOMEHOW another character speaks, too; a bunch of really unnecessary footnotes) but I'm just leaving it here.
Can someone PLEASE write some good cryptid novels?! Cause this ain't it.
TL;DR "Devolution" is basically just the "Jurassic Park" movie but with Bigfoot. Spielberg=1, Brooks=0.