The Devil in the White City

About The Devil in the White City

Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair That Changed America

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.

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 a time of magic and majesty, 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. In this book the smoke, romance, and mystery of the Gilded Age come alive as never before.

  1. Complete Title: The Devil in the White City
  2. Format: Audio Cassette
  3. Language: English
  4. Number of Pages: 15
  5. Publication Time: February 11, 2003
  6. Publisher: Random House Audio Publishing Group
  7. ISBN: 0739303406
  8. ISBN13: 9780739303405

About Erik Larson

Erik Larson Erik Larson

Erik Larson’s latest work of narrative nonfiction is DEAD WAKE: THE LAST CROSSING OF THE LUSITANIA, which became an immediate New York Times bestseller. His saga of the Chicago World’s Fair of 1893, THE DEVIL IN THE WHITE CITY, was a finalist for the National Book Award, and won an Edgar Award for fact-crime writing, and lingered on various NYT best-seller lists for the better part of a decade. Hulu plans to adapt the book for a limited TV series, with Leonardo DiCaprio and Martin Scorsese as executive producers. Erik’s IN THE GARDEN OF BEASTS, about America’s first ambassador to Nazi Germany and his daughter, has been optioned by Tom Hanks for development as a feature film.

His next book, THE SPLENDID AND THE VILE: A SAGA OF CHURCHILL, FAMILY, AND DEFIANCE DURING THE BLITZ, due out in early spring 2020, is a story of geopolitical brinksmanship during Churchill’s first year as prime minister, but also an intimate domestic drama, set against the backdrop of Churchill’s prime-ministerial country house, Chequers, and his “full-moon home,” Ditchley, where Churchill, his family, and his “Secret Circle” convene when the moon is in its brightest phases and the bombing threat is highest.

Erik is a former features writer for The Wall Street Journal and Time. His magazine stories have appeared in The New Yorker, The Atlantic Monthly, Harper’s and other publications.

He has taught non-fiction writing at San Francisco State, the Johns Hopkins Writing Seminars, the University of Oregon, and the Chuckanut Writers Conference, and has spoken to audiences from coast to coast. A former resident of Seattle, he now lives in Manhattan with his wife, a neonatologist and author of the nonfiction memoir, ALMOST HOME, which, as Erik puts it, “could make a stone cry.” They have three daughters in far-flung locations and professions.

Reviews The Devil in the White City

Poor Erik Larson.He wanted to write an extensive, in-depth look at the 1893 World’s Fair, which was a collaboration of some of the greatest creative minds in the country (including the guy who designe…

User ImageMadeline

This book is two, two, two books in one!Sorry, that was annoying. But it’s almost as if Erik Larson wrote two really short books—one about the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition and another about…

User ImageJason

4.5 FASCINATING…

User ImageRegan

CLICK HERE for a Booktube Video about:Ten Fabulous Book Reviews and One That Will Make You Go – doesn’t that belong to Miranda Reads?Now that you know this one made the list check the video review t…

User ImageMiranda Reads

Humour me and please allow the channeling an eighth grader for just a moment. OMG Squeee!!1 Teh best!! (Would an eighth grader say “teh best”?) And now we return you to our regularly scheduled review…

User ImageSeth T.

So, no offense to those that liked this book, but I’m throwing in the towel after 75 pages. It’s just not holding my interest. Part of the reason for this is that Larson’s writing style is way too spe…

User ImageDanielle

[Edited, pictures added 1/5/21]A fascinating book and an easy read. Chapter by chapter, in simple chronological order, the author juxtaposes preparations for the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair with the d…

User ImageJim Fonseca

The White City rises above the lake like a fantasy from another time that never existed but the eyes do not deceive this image is real, bright lights glow at night and millions of respectful , quiet…

User ImageHenry Avila

Larson could be the worst nonfiction writer working in America today. When he notes that “[Frederick Law] Olmsted was no literary stylist. Sentences wandered through the report like morning glory thro…

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