‘Where the Tour Buses Don’t Go’ is a different kind of Chicago guidebook from the creative mind of a former teacher

The latest steps in the seven decades-long creative journey of Gerry Lekas finds him exploring the lives and haunts of such notable Chicago-area characters as Sam Giancana, Jack Ruby, the Marx Brothers, Hilary Clinton, Mary Todd Lincoln and dozens of interesting others. In so doing he takes us to such places as the tavern where John Wayne Gacy and Jeffrey Dahmer are said to have hunted for their victims, a couple of not-very-well-known cemeteries, Charlie Chaplin’s apartment, the “sad and forlorn” Read-Dunning Memorial Park.

He has done this to fill the 222 pages of his first but impressive book, a lively and pleasantly idiosyncratic guide book titled “Where the Tour Buses Don’t Go: Chicago’s Hidden Sites of the Mysterious, Macabre, Ghostly & Glamorous” (Black Lyon Publishing).

I know what you are thinking: another guidebook? Lekas knows that too, and gets to it right away, writing, “There are already a ton of really well-done books covering the most well-known crime-y and ghosty sites of Chicago and environs. In addition, there are many, many ‘ghost tours’ and ‘gangster tours’ available to personally escort you there on an air-conditioned bus. Along with a very brief visit to the sites, you are treated to a ton of corny jokes.”

There’s nothing corny about this book which, in breezy style, stays true to its author’s aim: “To provide kind of a whirlwind guide to people, places and events comprising many of the darker (and, in the case of celebrities/movie star, glammy) aspects of the Chicago area.”