A review by theinkdarksea
American Lightning: Terror, Mystery, the Birth of Hollywood & the Crime of the Century by Howard Blum

3.0

This is a rare case of me enjoying the audio book more than I believe I would have enjoyed the written tome. While I adore historical non-fiction of this sort (i.e. Charlatan, The Devil in the White City), one of the habits that frustrates me is when the author fills in all of the empty spaces with actions that cannot possible be known. For example, at one point, Clarence Darrow leans back in his chair and looks up into the heavens and his mental state and the action are described clearly. It just comes across as an over-use of the imagination in a historical account. In text this may have frustrated me enough (alongside the extensive use of simile- so many similes), but as an audio book it lent itself to the rhythm of the story-telling.