The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson

From back cover: Bringing Chicago circa 1893 to vivid life, Erik Larson's spell-binding bestseller intertwines the true tale of two men - the brilliant architect behind the legendary 1893 World's Fair, striving to secure America's place in the world; and the cunning serial killer who used the fair to lure his victims to their death. Combining meticulous research with nail-biting storytelling, Erik Larson has crafted a narrative with all the wonder of newly discovered history and the thrills of the best fiction.

i don't enjoy non-fiction very often, but when i do, it involves some pretty twisted stuff.

while it's easy to read about things like the 1893 world's fair on wikipedia to get the general idea of what all went down, it's much more interesting and a better way to spend your time reading something like this work, which delves into one of the darker aspects of the huge event. many people know about h.h. holmes, but the book also gives the perspective of one of the people who planned the world's fair, which puts holmes' deviousness and cruelty into context. like a true crime doc, it was almost impossible to tear myself away from this once i had picked it up, and i truly recommend it to anyone remotely interested in a very dark moment of america's history.

I like any book that has trivia about pabst! I enjoyed this book a great deal, it could only have been improved by including more social history.

I was excited to read this after always hearing good things and seeing recommendations for it everywhere, but I didn't really like it at all...

It should have been called The White City (Featuring a Devil) because like 90% of this book is just about the logistics of setting up the World's Fair in Chicago and how the buildings were built. I found most of it pretty tedious, though there are a few interesting segments, such as the one about the first Ferris Wheel, and the actual writing is quite good.

The “devil” sections were pretty interesting, but besides the last hour or so of the book (which I actually really enjoyed) they seemed few and far between. I found myself losing the plot on these parts thigh, partially because of the infrequency and partially because of waning interest in the Fair story that it was interspersed in.

I listened to this on Audible (via their “Send this Book” feature, thanks Katie!) and Scott Brick is an excellent narrator. I've listened to him do Moneyball and In Cold Blood as well, and he just had a great voice for this.