Boston rumors/Weird Boston/Modern fantasy recommendations?
I'm planning on running a Dresden Files tabletop game in the near future if I can manage to work out the logistics. (I wish that were a trivial conditional...) I'm looking for good inspiration material.
Currently, I am leaning towards setting the game in greater Boston just for group familiarity and ease of improvisation. The problem is that, compared with New York, I have *much* less idea of what the local legends and rumors are. (Why am I not running a New York game? Partly, I'm out of date, and partly, my knowledge is extremely incomplete, particularly about the boroughs. And just sticking to Manhattan and New Jersey loses a lot of the fun complexity. Plus most of my possible player set is less familiar with The City. Maybe if a real campaign takes off we'll have a travel arc where I can really play with the abandoned subway tunnels, pneumatic tubes, ancient relics and graveyards, and then there's everything you can do with Central Park... ah, hell, maybe I *should* do New York, but I'm not going to give up yet.)
So I'm looking for a few things:
1) Weird Boston/Weird New England recommendations. Could be fiction or non-fiction, even travel guides or internet rumors. Basically, *local* weird idea fodder. Hauntings, conspiracies, monsters, lights in the sky... whatever.
2) Good solid Bostonian dirt, current or historic. Doesn't have to be substantiated, rumors are fine, the more sordid the better. Bonus points if it involves factions, organizations, or generally anyone in power. The best I've got so far is the long-standing variations on "The mafia runs all construction projects/the big dig was a mafia payoff" and assorted random sex-and-alcohol-and-drugs politician scandals.
3) Good books in the same genre as the Dresden Files that could fit into the same or a similar universe. Which is to say, most good urban fantasy.
Currently, I am leaning towards setting the game in greater Boston just for group familiarity and ease of improvisation. The problem is that, compared with New York, I have *much* less idea of what the local legends and rumors are. (Why am I not running a New York game? Partly, I'm out of date, and partly, my knowledge is extremely incomplete, particularly about the boroughs. And just sticking to Manhattan and New Jersey loses a lot of the fun complexity. Plus most of my possible player set is less familiar with The City. Maybe if a real campaign takes off we'll have a travel arc where I can really play with the abandoned subway tunnels, pneumatic tubes, ancient relics and graveyards, and then there's everything you can do with Central Park... ah, hell, maybe I *should* do New York, but I'm not going to give up yet.)
So I'm looking for a few things:
1) Weird Boston/Weird New England recommendations. Could be fiction or non-fiction, even travel guides or internet rumors. Basically, *local* weird idea fodder. Hauntings, conspiracies, monsters, lights in the sky... whatever.
2) Good solid Bostonian dirt, current or historic. Doesn't have to be substantiated, rumors are fine, the more sordid the better. Bonus points if it involves factions, organizations, or generally anyone in power. The best I've got so far is the long-standing variations on "The mafia runs all construction projects/the big dig was a mafia payoff" and assorted random sex-and-alcohol-and-drugs politician scandals.
3) Good books in the same genre as the Dresden Files that could fit into the same or a similar universe. Which is to say, most good urban fantasy.