Janet Maslin of The New York Times praised the book as "vivid" and "lively", and commented on how the research done by Larson on the many "odd and amazing" events of the 1893 exhibition are "given shape and energy" by his "dramatic inclinations".[4]
David Traxel for The New York Times criticized Larson for having "little sense of pacing or focus" in the "grab-bag" approach he took when discussing the exhibition. Regarding the discussion of Holmes in the book, he writes that Larson's "imaginative touches…sometimes goes farther than the sources warrant".[5]
In a review for Newsweek, Malcolm Jones wrote "only in the notes at the back of the book does [Larson] admit that the chapters describing Holmes's murders are merely conjecture built on a handful of facts"; even so, the story of the fair was "too enchanting" so even that "grave misstep can't doom" the book.[6]
