For the past several years, I’ve had a healthy(?) obsession with New England history and folktales. And while a lot of what you’ll find inside The Woburn Chronicles stems directly from my twisted imagination, you’ll also find that the three supernatural tales that comprise Chronicles are littered with historical and mythological references.
Without a doubt, doing the research for this book took longer than the writing, and it’s hard for me to say which activity I found more enjoyable: the former or the latter. What I can say for sure is that I’ve learned a hell of a lot about the place I call home and have developed a newfound respect for all those peoples, native and immigrant alike, who’ve inhabited this land over the centuries.
For those of you who also have an unquenchable thirst for stories, factual and fictional, set in and around Woburn, and Boston, and New England at large, I’ve put together a condensed list of works that inspired The Woburn Chronicles.
Like all writers, I stand on the shoulders of giants.
A List of Works That Inspired the Woburn Chronicles
- A History of Boston in 50 Artifacts (2016) by Joseph M. Bagley
- New England Legends and Folklore (1883) by Samuel Adams Drake
- Bootleggers, Lobstermen & Lumberjacks: Fifty of the Grittiest Moments in the History of Hardscrabble New England (2010) by Matthew P. Mayo
- Woburn, a Past Observed: A Civic, Social, and Political History of Woburn, Massachusetts (2000) by John D. McElhiney
- Woburn: Forgotten Tales & Untold Stories (2004) by William C. Campbell, Robert E. Maguire, John D. McElhiney, and Thomas A. Smith
- Woburn (Images of America: Massachusetts) (2000) by Kathleen M. O’Doherty
- Woburn: Hidden Tales of a Tannery Town (2008) by Marie Coady
- Wonder-Working Providence of Sions Saviour in New England (1867) by Edward Johnson
I. E. Kneverday 