Reviews tagging 'Alcohol'

The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair That Changed America by Erik Larson

6 reviews

psdarlin's review against another edition

informative reflective medium-paced

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Torture, Violence, and Murder

Moderate: Confinement, Gun violence, Child death, Mental illness, Colonisation, Death, Racial slurs, and Kidnapping

Minor: Racism, Stalking, Suicide, Violence, Alcohol, Alcoholism, Fire/Fire injury, Domestic abuse, Sexism, Medical content, Chronic illness, and Homophobia

headachesince03's review against another edition

adventurous dark informative inspiring mysterious tense slow-paced

4.5

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Infidelity, Physical abuse, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Abortion, Alcohol, Misogyny, Police brutality, Pregnancy, Religious bigotry, Sexism, Torture, Violence, Xenophobia, Bullying, Death of parent, Miscarriage, Blood, Body horror, Child abuse, Colonisation, Racism, Terminal illness, Confinement, Death, Mental illness, Toxic relationship, Addiction, Alcoholism, Gun violence, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Child death, Classism, Cultural appropriation, Dementia, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Forced institutionalization, Gaslighting, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Medical content, and Murder

librarymouse's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional informative mysterious sad tense medium-paced

3.75

The literary descriptions and firsthand accounts of the fair, and the effort and love put into it's design and creation made me wish I could have attended. The detailed descriptions of Holmes' murders and his disarmingly charming personality made me glad that I was born over a full century after 1893. I like greatly enjoyed The Devil in the White City, the second half was a far easier read than the first. I'm not sure if I've retained as much of the information about the fair's designers and the events that took place while it was open as I wanted to. While interesting, the section about the initial design process and the political lobbying that took place in order to get the fair to occur in Chicago read similarly to a textbook, in stark contrast with the narrative way the rest of the history was told. Overall, an informative and interesting read. I would use enjoyable to describe the writing, but not the content.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Child abuse, Chronic illness, Gore, Blood, Grief, Gun violence, Infidelity, Suicide attempt, Abortion, Classism, Colonisation, Confinement, Death, Death of parent, Dementia, Alcohol, Domestic abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Murder, Suicide, Child death, Forced institutionalization, Medical trauma, Terminal illness, Torture, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Mental illness, and Misogyny

Moderate: Racial slurs

Minor: Xenophobia

cupofbooksreviews's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative mysterious sad tense slow-paced

I have given The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson two out of five stars ⭐️⭐️

A dark and devious book filled with architecture and killings. A mixture of two I never thought I would read in the same book.

This book started off quite strong for me; learning about an architect called Daniel H. Burnham and a serial killer called H.H. Holmes. I find non-fiction books fascinating especially when based around true crime events, although that meant that there were a lot of brutal attacks that happened to a lot of people.

I found this book started to repeat itself quite a lot, especially during the chapters that surround Daniel Burnham and the architecture of the Chicago World Fair. I appreciated that the information was important and relevant however, due to the repeated information I started to become quite bored of Daniel Burnham’s story. 

As I became less intrigued by this book, I ended up reading this book for a fair few weeks which dragged out the experience. I had hoped there was more information regarding H.H. Holmes rather than Daniel Burnham.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abortion, Alcohol, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Blood, Body horror, Child abuse, Child death, Death, Gore, Kidnapping, Miscarriage, Murder, Physical abuse, and Violence

meganpbennett's review against another edition

dark informative mysterious medium-paced

3.0

I read The Devil in the White City on the advice of a true crime-loving librarian colleague. It's interesting, with H.H. Holmes killing indiscriminately around during the Chicago World's Fair, though I started reading the book without realizing that H.H. Holmes was the Devil in question. 

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

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Content Warnings

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

renbot's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional funny informative mysterious slow-paced

4.5

An incredible journey where you truly care for the victories and failures of all of the characters

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Murder, Torture, Suicide, Stalking, Mental illness, Medical content, Kidnapping, Fire/Fire injury, Death, Chronic illness, Child death, and Confinement

Moderate: Suicide, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Racism, Fire/Fire injury, Abandonment, Infidelity, Forced institutionalization, Dementia, Grief, and Gore

Minor: Cultural appropriation and Alcohol

Multiple women and children are murdered, some depictions are graphic, includes scenes of torture