Carr's debut novel is an impressive literary experiment ... Because chapters rotate between literary forms and time periods, readers may find the narrative structure challenging to follow. However, Carr effectively weaves the stories of his sprawling cast of minor and major figures to underscore the city's myriad threads of development ... An ambitious literary debut that occupies a liminal space between alternative history and experimental literature.

Carr’s intricately woven debut evokes the history of nineteenth-century Chicago while showcasing important but little-known historical figures and fictional people from different walks of life ... While their personalities are colorfully rendered, the depictions of Native Americans aren’t terribly nuanced. More eclectic than Micheneresque, the novel nonetheless offers a strong sense of place. Ambition, injustice, and opportunity all play roles as Chicago expands outward and upward. Over time, the disparate stories, which span the entire century, intersect in delightfully unexpected ways.

If Make Me a City really had been written in 1902, then it would be an extraordinarily forward-thinking and valuable corrective to the erasure of the contributions of women, immigrants and people of color to America’s 'second city.' As it is, Carr’s ambitious and presumably well-intentioned tome comes across as pandering, self-satisfied and ultimately wrongheaded ... approaches literary blackface ... When a book immediately elicits doubt over its authority and dexterity to represent its subjects, it’s hard for the reader to recover. This is not to say that authors can’t represent difference; they can and they should. It’s not even to say that a white British man like Carr can’t write from the point of view of a mixed-race man like de Sable. But writing across difference should be humanizing, and representing difference isn’t the same as demonstrating one’s own enlightenment. Alas, Carr writes with a cartoonish lack of nuance ... depicts most of his characters in strokes so broad they fall simplistically into the slots of noble hero or irredeemable villain ... throughout, the novel seeks to take retroactive credit for compassion and right-mindedness it hasn’t earned.

[The book's] development through characters means that there is little in the way of plot propelling the novel, which takes a chronological approach mirroring the various directions of the city’s progress. At just under 500 pages, many readers might need more to hold their attention. Taking in the stories of immigrants, predominantly from Ireland, Germany and Sweden, Carr gives their accounts in modes that are sometimes successful, but at other points are overblown and stereotyped ... This is an ambitious book, and its prose is often entertaining and very readable. However, its formal aspirations never quite ring true, and sometimes the inhabitation of different voices and genres falls from imitation into parody ... This is an unruly novel: daring and sometimes entertaining, but unfortunately falling short of its own ambition.

Carr’s enticing debut is an 'alternative history' of ... fascinating characters ... clever ... This is a gritty and entertaining fictional history of a great American city.

The rise of Chicago in the 19th century provides the frame for a trove of colorful stories and characters in this entertaining debut novel ... Melodrama mars a few scenes, and the frequent shifts in voice and style may test some readers’ patience. For the most part, Carr has a sure touch, and in many extended anecdotes, his narrative skills show exceptional detail, pacing, and tension. A solid storyteller enlivens a rich patch of American history.