The Devil in the White City, by Erik Larson

It's been a long time since I've written a review! If any of y'all follow me on Goodreads, you'll notice that I've finished some books that I've neglected to review properly on here. Starting with this post, I'll be attempting to play catch-up. 

Genre: Nonfiction, U.S. History, Crime, Urban Studies

Rating: ★★★★

Published: February 10, 2004

Publisher: Knopf Doubleday

Pages: 464

I've been interested in reading Erik Larson's Devil in the White City for a while now; I'm interested in crime, the Columbia Exposition (aka, the Chicago World's Fair), and Chicago in general, so this book seemed like a good match for me. I was further intrigued by the connection that Larson set out to depict in the book between the 1893 Chicago World's Fair and the serial killer, H. H. Holmes. Larson's intentions in White City were very clear to me: to describe the cycle of creation and destruction that two men, Daniel Burnham (the leading architect and planner for the Chicago World's Fair) and H. H. Holmes influenced during the fair, and how the fair changed the course of American architecture, culture, and history.

The Devil in the White City is, first and foremost, a history book that chronicles the buildup to and the execution of the 1893 World's Fair in Chicago. Held to celebrate the 400th anniversary of Columbus's arrival in the Americas in 1492, the fair was also a chance for the city of Chicago to announce that it had "arrived" on the world's stage. In total, over 27 million people ended up visiting "the White City."

The Devil in the White City operates along two parallel story lines: the first chronicling the entirety of the fair, from its inception to its end; the second tells the story of H. H. Holmes, the serial killer operating under the protection of the fair, from his childhood to his eventual incarceration.

Despite the title, I didn't find Holmes or his crimes to be the real focus of this book; while Holmes was certainly an ominous force that Larson alluded to repeatedly, I feel like the majority of this book's action and splendor came in the descriptions of the fair.

I thought that this book was really interesting in examining American society, Chicago's history, and how the fair changed them both immediately and later on. (And example of "further down the line": Walt Disney's dad was part of the construction team; he applied what his dad told him about constructing the White City when creating the Magic Kingdom.) I think this book is good for anyone who doesn't mind sorting through multiple characters and plot lines, while also being interested in American/Chicagoan history. 

However, since there is so much exposition regarding the fair, I'd say that any other reader would have to be pretty tolerant due to the fact that there is a lot of material regarding architecture and construction. So, yeah, the book gets dry at times. But I'd say that Larson deftly deals with the unglamorous parts of the fair, crafting a narrative that is both enticing and intriguing.