"The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair That Changed America" by Erik Larson has spent almost 300 weeks on The New York Times Bestseller list, since its publication in 2003. "The Devil in the White City" marks its return to bookstores on the heels of the purchase of the rights, by Paramount Pictures. The future film is a joint venture of Leonardo DiCaprio and Martin Scorsese. 

1890s Chicago was a time of hubris and innocent excitement. American architects, politicians, and laborers dared to construct a World's Fair that would rival the latest Exposition in Paris. Headed by architect Daniel Burnham, time, talent, and money poured into creating a city unto itself in the Fairgrounds. In this energetic and frenzied environment, Dr. H.H. Holmes was able to lure his victims to his establishment just outside The White City. Young, attractive, and naïve women employed in Holmes's stores did not stay very long. In fact, they were never heard from again.

With hints of the old black and whites classics, "Gaslight" and "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", Erik Larson's imagery takes us back in full technicolor. Easy to read details make the past as real as this very moment. With a storyteller's soul, Larson engages us as if we were reading fiction - as if the horrors that occurred so long ago are merely stories, not historical facts. 

Minutiae, well-placed, add to the suspense. Many of the items that make up our American lives today began at the Chicago World's Fair. We see the structures, larger than life. We smell the gas jets, beginning to be edged out by newly commercialized electricity. We feel the tension as artistic temperaments clash with economic crises. We hear the angry cries of laborers on strike, demanding a minimum wage and better working conditions. We sense the eerie darkness of odd angles and windowless rooms in a hotel, built only for one purpose. We feel the compelling sadness and frustration of a detective, following sparse leads and his nagging intuition. 

There are many names in the book, but Larson masterfully introduces us to each figure, and then uses great skill in reminding us along the way who is important to the story and why. And while the tale is dark and sinister in nature, this book does not read like a horror novel. It is an accessible examination of the juxtaposition between a lofty vision for superior world standing and the desolate madness of a gentlemanly killer.

Bouncing back and forth between stories of the Fair's birth and the numberless deaths at the hand of a psychopath, the influence each had on the other remains both disturbing and amazing. Larson weaves the creepy and the fascinating with effective chapter breaks, holding us in a thriller's suspense. Constant action anchors us in each individual story, but with a hindsight afforded only to those of us so far in the future.

Photo credit: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/c/c7/DWCity.jpg/220px-DWCity.jpg