The Devil in the White City
Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair That Changed America
Ratings2
Average rating5
15
Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair That Changed America
Ratings2
Average rating5
#1 NATIONAL BESTSELLER • NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FINALIST • From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Splendid and the Vile comes the true tale of the 1893 World's Fair in Chicago and the cunning serial killer who used the magic and majesty of the fair to lure his victims to their death. “As absorbing a piece of popular history as one will ever hope to find.” —San Francisco Chronicle 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. Two men, each handsome and unusually adept at his chosen work, embodied an element of the great dynamic that characterized America’s rush toward the twentieth century. The architect was Daniel Hudson Burnham, the fair’s brilliant director of works and the builder of many of the country’s most important structures, including the Flatiron Building in New York and Union Station in Washington, D.C. The murderer was Henry H. Holmes, a young doctor who, in a malign parody of the White City, built his “World’s Fair Hotel” just west of the fairgrounds—a torture palace complete with dissection table, gas chamber, and 3,000-degree crematorium. Burnham overcame tremendous obstacles and tragedies as he organized the talents of Frederick Law Olmsted, Charles McKim, Louis Sullivan, and others to transform swampy Jackson Park into the White City, while Holmes used the attraction of the great fair and his own satanic charms to lure scores of young women to their deaths. What makes the story all the more chilling is that Holmes really lived, walking the grounds of that dream city by the lake. The Devil in the White City draws the reader into the enchantment of the Guilded Age, made all the more appealing by a supporting cast of real-life characters, including Buffalo Bill, Theodore Dreiser, Susan B. Anthony, Thomas Edison, Archduke Francis Ferdinand, and others. Erik Larson’s gifts as a storyteller are magnificently displayed in this rich narrative of the master builder, the killer, and the great fair that obsessed them both.
Reviews with the most likes.
A captivating look into the United States' late nineteenth century, the Chicago Fair and its influence on the future of architecture, spiced with the history of America's first mass-murderer. I couldn't stop listening, and let a lot of other books languish to get to the end of this one.
I loved this book!
I knew of H. H. Holmes already from documentaries and podcasts, but this couches that horror in a broader context of the Chicago World's Fair and the cultural climate at the time. Be warned that Holmes is not the main focus if that's the hook for you, but rather the Fair is the foundation of this book. Larson unfolds these events with fastidious detail, wry humor and subtle yet affecting expressiveness. I was left at the end with a sense of wonder and sadness which I think is quite the feat.
