#161 in Historical fiction
The Alienist
- 588
- Pages
- about 11 h
- Reading time
- Grand Prix de Littérature Policière
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Our view
“The Alienist” is at its best as history: New York in 1896 and the first steps of criminal profiling are rendered with authority. Dr Laszlo Kreizler and Theodore Roosevelt, who heads the city’s police, hunt a killer with fingerprints and psychology, and the crimes are gruesome. Some readers race through it; others find it dry or lose track of the large cast. Nearly six hundred pages, for those who want period detail with their mystery.
The view of the BookRank editors, written from readers’ ratings and comments. It does not affect the score or the book’s place in a ranking.
About the book
The Alienist is a crime novel by Caleb Carr first published in 1994 and is the first book in the Kreizler series. It takes place in New York City in 1896, and includes appearances by many famous figures of New York society in that era, including Theodore Roosevelt and J. P. Morgan. The story follows Roosevelt, then New York City police commissioner, and Dr. Laszlo Kreizler, as their investigative team attempts to solve gruesome murders through new methods including fingerprinting and psychology. The first murder victim investigated is a 13-year-old immigrant who has had his eyes removed, his genitals removed and stuffed in his mouth, and other injuries. The investigators deal with various interest groups that wish to maintain the status quo regarding the poor immigrant population in New York City. The sequel to the novel is The Angel of Darkness.
Where the score comes from
The sources average 7.7 across 329 ratings — not yet many, so the reader vote carries 69% of the weight and the rest pulls toward the Historical fiction average of 8.0. That is how 7.7 comes out.
| Source | Average | Ratings | Weight |
|---|---|---|---|
| Open Library | 7.6 | 23 | 7% |
| Google Books | 8.0 | 14 | 4% |
| Hardcover | 7.7 | 292 | 89% |
Frequently asked
How long is The Alienist?
It has 588 pages — longer than 93% of the ranked books in Historical fiction.
In this book
Themes this book shares with others — each leads to the best books on it.
If you liked this
Same shelf — Historical fiction — with scores between 7.6 and 8.1, closest to this book.
