There are two stories interwoven in this book: One is the story of the making of the 1893 Columbian Exposition in Chicago (which was, remember, only a decade removed from its great fire), and the other is the story of a serial killer who lived a life of middle-class respectability on the outskirts of the city. The story of the exposition is endlessly fascinating and brilliantly recreated, and the crime story is sometimes that good.

I kept waiting, however, for Larson to reveal the common thread (other than place and time) that bound the two together. He does, eventually, but it's tenuous and unsatisfying. At the end, I found myself wishing that he'd told the stories separately, giving the Columbian Exposition a book of its own, which it surely deserves.

Larson takes pains to point out that "everything in quotation marks" came from a verifiable source. Fair enough, but (especially in the crime story) there is a great deal that is not in quotation marks, and it is impossible to know how much comes from contemporary court records and other accounts, and how much is Larson's best guess. It all *reads* well, but by the last third of the book it began to leave me with a slight sense of unease.

Sending to bookshop for his classroom

I understand what you mean about the tenuous connections, but the narrative style makes up for that weakness for me. If more histories read this well, our students would certainly enjoy history more. One of my favorite books last year.