Denis says :
Referring to Abd al-Baha' and Shoghi Effendi, he (Baha'i Scholar, Gollmer) writes: 'The lives of these two chroniclers testify to this, embodying as they do the ethical principles of their faith'. I've no doubt Shoghi Effendi was the best of men (though I know less about him than I do about, oh, let's say, Ann Frank), but the fact is that, when he wrote God Passes By, he hung his 'facts' on a preconceived framework. Just as I might distort historical characters or events in writing a novel, so he told his tale in order to meet the demands of a grand scheme, a divine drama played out in Shiraz, Baghdad, or Acre. It's a work of genius, but I don't think it's a reliable historical source, if for no other reason than that there isn't a single reference from beginning to end. We're meant to take everything on Shoghi Effendi's say-so. Whereas academic books are open and transparent, displaying their origins in the form of citations and bibliographies, God Passes By is wholly opaque, cramming primary and secondary materials in together without rhyme or reason, and leaving the reader in the dark throughout. So just what Shoghi Effendi's rather unknown life has to do with the veracity of his text is quite beyond me.
http://bahai-library.com/maceoin_schaefer_crooked_straight#n1