Curious Toys (Elizabeth Hand)

For fans of Erik Larson's The Devil in the White City, you might enjoy this Chicago mystery.

Set in 1915 (22 years after the Chicago's World Fair), Pin is a fourteen-year-old tomboy who runs with a local gang around the Riverview amusement park.

When Pin witnesses an unidentified male enter a dark ride with a young girl and leave without her, she feels uneasy then sick, when a girl is found dead at the scene.

Determined to discover the killer, Pin finds an unlikely ally in the reclusive artist, Henry Darger, who is still reeling over the death of another young girl, four-year-old Elsie Paroubek.

I appreciated the noir feel to this novel and even more so to Hand's attention to detail, as I felt transported into this underbelly of old time Chicago. Hand includes a detailed background on Henry Darger and how this lesser-known artist became a driving force behind this well-crafted story.