The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair that Changed America

At the Fair that Changed America, Murder, Magic and Madness The gifts of Erik Larson as a storyteller are displayed magnificently in this rich narrative of the master builder, the killer and the great fair that obsessed them both. Two men embodied an element of the great dynamic that characterized America's rush toward the twentieth century, each handsome and unusually adept at his chosen job. The architect was Daniel Hudson Burnham, the brilliant works director of the fair 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 assassin was Henry H. Holmes, a young doctor who built his "World's Fair Hotel" just west of the fairgrounds—a torture palace c in a malignant parody of the White City. Burnham overcame tremendous obstacles and tragedies by organizing the talents of Frederick Law Olmsted, Charles McKim, Louis Sullivan and others to transform the swampy Jackson Park into the White City, while Holmes used the attraction of the big 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 by the lake around the grounds of that dream town. The Devil in the White City draws the reader into a time of magic and majesty, made all the more appealing by a supportive cast of real-life characters, including Buffalo Bill, Theodore Dreiser, Susan B. Anthony, Thomas Edison, Archduke Francis Ferdinand and others. In this book the Gilded Age smoke, romance, and mystery come alive like never before.... Read More