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ascalun's review against another edition
3.5
Graphic: Child death, Death, Murder, Abortion, and Gaslighting
Moderate: Fire/Fire injury, Forced institutionalization, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Misogyny, Suicidal thoughts, and Toxic relationship
Minor: Confinement, Cultural appropriation, Drug use, Forced institutionalization, and Medical content
lyssierose09's review against another edition
4.75
Graphic: Child death, Death, Medical content, Murder, and Violence
Moderate: Gaslighting, Gore, Kidnapping, Abortion, and Torture
Minor: Fire/Fire injury, Gun violence, Misogyny, and Pregnancy
lexispike's review against another edition
3.0
Graphic: Child death, Death, Murder, and Gaslighting
meganpbennett's review against another edition
3.0
The book has lots of interesting detail on the World's Fair - after all, how could Chicago hope to beat Eiffel and his Tower from the previous World's Fair? Enter an engineer named... Ferris.
The book was less graphic than I thought it would be, but there is rather disturbing imagery involving Holmes killing and disposing of the bodies.
I think the book would have been stronger had the author not switched perspectives between Holmes and the builders of the Fair every chapter. I think it would have made more sense for the author to have chosen a time frame - three months? - and written about the building of the Fair, then Pendergast, then Holmes. That would have strengthened the connect between them
Graphic: Murder, Child death, Death, Violence, Body horror, Confinement, Gore, Torture, Blood, Medical content, Kidnapping, Medical trauma, Fire/Fire injury, Misogyny, Abortion, and Gaslighting
Moderate: Alcohol and Pregnancy
alliemikennareads's review against another edition
4.0
Bullet point review:
- I forgot how much the book discusses architecture; this got tedious at times.
- I loved the rich detail about the Chicago worlds fair and the way the book splices the fair, its history, and HH Holmes’ evil deeds together.
- I still found it a great form of true crime/ nonfiction that reads like fiction.
TW for some really graphic descriptions of a slaughterhouse, gas chambers, suicide, murder of women and children and dead body discovery.
If you can get past the graphic parts and like historical fiction, I’d definitely recommend this one!
Graphic: Suicide, Murder, Violence, Fire/Fire injury, Gaslighting, Child death, Child abuse, Body horror, Confinement, Death, and Medical trauma