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Devolution: A Firsthand Account of the Rainier Sasquatch Massacre

by Max Brooks · 2020

As the ash and chaos from Mount Rainier’s eruption swirled and finally settled, the story of the Greenloop massacre has passed unnoticed, unexamined . . . until now. But the journals of resident Kate Holland, recovered… more

27 quotes ★ 3.89 (60,050) Horror

Quotes from the Book

It’s great to live free of the other sheep until you hear the wolves howl.
42
People only see the present through the lenses of their personal pasts.
22
Why are we always looking for someone else to save us instead of trying to save ourselves?
15
I heard a theory once that if aliens ever do come calling, they may very well be hostile, because the same brains that mastered spaceflight learned to think by hunting.
14
Denial is an irrational dismissal of danger. Phobia is an irrational fear of one.
14
They all want to live “in harmony with nature” before some of them realize, too late, that nature is anything but harmonious.
13
I think the human mind isn’t comfortable with mysteries. We’re always looking for answers to the unexplained. And if an answer can’t come from facts, we’ll try to cobble one together from old stories.
13
The whole country rests on a system that sacrifices resilience for comfort.
12
According to Darwin’s Origin of Species, it is not the most intellectual of the species that survives; it is not the strongest that survives; but the species that survives is the one that is best able to adapt and adjust to the changing environment in which it finds itself.
11
Maybe some instinct told them it was time to swap evolution for devolution, reach back to who they were to take back what was theirs.
9
Injury turns you from a giver to a taker. Taking up our resources, our time to care for you. That’s why most weapons of war are designed to injure instead of kill. Wounded are more of a drain than the dead.
9
Different places, different ages, completely different cultures, and yet they came up with similar weapons and tactics. Is there something about how we’re wired, something universally human?
9
A lot less energy to convert animal into animal than vegetable into animal. And the brain boost we got from that bonanza. Tools, language, cooperation. You can see the incentive for all the advances that make us human. More meat. Bigger brains. Bigger brains. More meat. I wonder what it looked like, when we first tasted fresh blood. What did we think? What did we feel? That moment when everything changed. From scavenger to predator. Hunted to hunter.
9
We can't just mourn the deaths, we also have to celebrate the lives. We need Anne Frank's diary, but we also need her smile on the cover.
8
A lie will gallop halfway round the world before the truth has time to pull its breeches on. —CORDELL HULL, secretary of state to President Franklin Delano R
8
Selfless suffering feels good for short crusades, but as a way of life, it’s unsustainable.
7
The human heart can only absorb so much pain.
5
Those poor bastards didn’t want a rural life. They expected an urban life in a rural setting. They tried to adapt their environment instead of adapting to it.
5
All positivity all the time. Learn to fly, even if it’s in the Hindenburg.
5
I couldn’t believe that something so beautiful could come from fire.
5
I trust my nose, ears, eyes. But my brain…
5
If there’s anything worse than visualizing your own death, it’s knowing that you caused it.
5
Are you going to deny that King’s leverage was based on the fear of Malcolm X?” Sensing an opening, I tried to break the siege. “An open hand works when the alternative is a fist.
5
I’m open to any discovery, as long as it’s based on hard, physical evidence. Facts are supposed to banish monsters… She sighs. …not invite them i
5
Whenever someone said “Good luck” or “Godspeed,” I only heard “Better you than me.
4
These trees are happy. Yes, I said it. Why wouldn’t they be, in this rich, soft, rain-washed soil.
4
People are the problem. Nature is your friend.
4

About Max Brooks

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About the book

As the ash and chaos from Mount Rainier’s eruption swirled and finally settled, the story of the Greenloop massacre has passed unnoticed, unexamined . . . until now.

But the journals of resident Kate Holland, recovered from the town’s bloody wreckage, capture a tale too harrowing—and too earth-shattering in its implications—to be forgotten.

In these pages, Max Brooks brings Kate’s extraordinary account to light for the first time, faithfully reproducing her words alongside his own extensive investigations into the massacre and the legendary beasts behind it.

Kate’s is a tale of unexpected strength and resilience, of humanity’s defiance in the face of a terrible predator’s gaze, and inevitably, of savagery and death.

Yet it is also far more than that.

Because if what Kate Holland saw in those days is real, then we must accept the impossible. We must accept that the crea

Book details

First published
2020
Genre
Horror
Goodreads rating
3.89 (60k ratings)

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