Seattle-based author Erik Larson was trolling for material a few years ago when he remembered something he’d come across while researching his 2000 best-seller, Isaac’s Storm. Or rather, someone: Englewood-based serial killer H.H. Holmes. He started to read more about Holmes, a New Hampshire-born ladies’ man whose real name was Herman Webster Mudgett. Before and during the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition, Holmes lured his victims–mostly young women–to his three-story “horror castle” at 63rd and Wallace, a hotel for fairgoers that he’d equipped with gas chambers, trapdoors, secret passages, and a basement crematory. Prior to his execution in 1896, he confessed to the murders of 27 people, but some estimates place the number as high as 200. When police inspectors searched his abandoned Chicago home, they found piles of bones and charred human remains.
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Larson will discuss his book Tuesday, February 18, at 7 at the University of Chicago’s Ida Noyes Hall, 1212 E. 59th (773-752-4381). On Thursday, February 20, he’ll appear at 4 at Centuries & Sleuths, 7419 W. Madison in Forest Park (708-771-7243), and at 7 at Anderson’s Bookshop, 123 W. Jefferson in Naperville (630-355-2665). All events are free.
