I Finally Read a Book

I should confess that it only took me eight months to read it but I did get it done. It's The Devil in the White City, a book by Erik Larson.


I will also confess that it's a nonfiction book, which is probably the only reason I read it. It's about Chicago in the Guilded Age, circa 1880-1890's, when Chicago won the bid to host the World's Fair. The fair was going to be the biggest event in the US and the country was relying on Chicago to prove how grand and powerful they were after they were shamed by the rest of the world's great leaps in technology and grandeur. The book follows the architects who built the fair in a matter of months and their struggles to overcome the hasty deadline.

While that plot certainly was interesting, I found the counter storyline to be more captivating. The book also followed H. H. Holmes, one of the most heartless serial killers of his day. I'd be willing to claim that he was even more deadly than Jack the Ripper. Holmes built his own 'castle' on the edge of Chicago, right across the street from the World's Fair. This castle had dozens of secret chambers, hallways that would suddenly bank strange directions, rooms without windows, and closets and doors that seemed to have no purpose. As he was building the three story hotel that took up an entire block, he constantly fired and hired different construction workers so no one would be aware of his demented intentions and chambers.

Over time, he lured women, their children, and their unfortunate husbands into the hotel with promises of wealth and jobs. The husbands would eventually disappear and the women were oftentimes killed in the secret chambers. Holmes prepared a vat of chemicals where he threw bodies in order to quickly discard of them, an airtight vault where he could gas victims or strangle them to death, and furnaces where he could burn them. He even stretched a few victims until their bodies broke apart. Others he dissected alive.

Holmes' victim count was confessed to be 28 but up to 200 more disappearances were accredited to him. Holmes is definitely a chilling character. There were parts in the book where I would shudder because of the acts he committed. However, he was also brilliant and that's what interested me. He was an amazing scientist, doctor, and businessman. Even though he wasn't born in wealth and had an abusive father, he managed to find wealth on his own terms.

Even though I liked this book I don't think I'll be reading anymore books about serial killers. I think it's time to move on to more positive things. I now have a book I want to start that follows an infantry through Normandy in World War II. Here goes another 6 months of reading one book!