Boston in fiction

This articles lists various works of fiction that take place in Boston, Massachusetts:

Videogames

• The Scout, a fictional character in the videogame called Team Fortress 2 is known to be from Boston and speaks with a Boston Accent.
• In Tony Hawk's Underground 2, one of the levels is set in Boston.
• Mafia: The City of Lost Heaven the City of Lost Heaven bears a slight resemblance to Boston.
• In Rock Band and Rock Band 2, Boston is a featured city that one's fictional band can play gigs in.
• In Assassin's Creed III, Boston features as a main city during the course of the game.
• In The Last of Us, some of the game is set in post-apocalyptic Boston.

Literature

• Altered States by Paddy Chayefsky
• As I was Crossing Boston Common by Norma Farber
• Back Bay by William Martin
• The Big Dig by Linda Barnes
• Blaze by Richard Bachman
• The "Bloody Jack" historical-fiction series, by L. A. Meyer. First mentioned in The Curse of the Blue Tattoo, when Jacky is put off in Boston to attend Lawson Peabody's School for Young Girls
• The Bostonians by Henry James; life in aristocratic Boston during the late nineteenth century
• The Late George Apley by John P. Marquand. A tragicomic satire of the life of an upper-class Bostonian from the mid-19th century to the Great Depression. Winner of the Pulitzer Prize.
• Boston Adventure by Jean Stafford
• Caucasia, by Danzy Senna, a coming of age novel of Birdie, a biracial girl.
• Carlotta Carlyle Mysteries by Linda Barnes; featuring a 6'1" redheaded, taxi-driving detective in Boston
• A Case of Need by Michael Crichton
• A Catch of Consequence by Diana Norman
• Cell by Stephen King; A traditional zombie story set in present-day Boston.
• The Chippendales by Robert Grant, novel, old Boston society confronted by the emerging new in the 1880s
• Combat Boy by James Vance Elliott, a novel featuring both the Boston crime world of the 70's and the Mass. high-tech world of the 90's
• The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown; Boston is the home of protagonist Robert Langdon.
• The Dante Club, a murder mystery featuring Harvard personalities Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, James Russell Lowell, and Oliver Wendell Holmes, as well as publisher James Thomas Fields takes place in Boston and Cambridge, by Matthew Pearl (2003).
• Dead Heat by Linda Barnes
• The Europeans by Henry James
• Firmin by Sam Savage, a magical-realist account of the destruction of Scollay Square
• Flashpoint by Linda Barnes
• Flynn's World by Gregory Mcdonald
• Future Boston a shared universe novel by the Cambridge Science Fiction Writers Workshop
• The Given Day, novel by Dennis Lehane, takes place in post World War I Boston
• Gone, Baby, Gone by Dennis Lehane
• The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood; post-nuclear Cambridge and Boston are the setting of this dystopian novel.
• Home Before Dark by Eileen Bassing
• Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace is set in a partly fictionalized Boston.
• Johnny Tremain by Esther Forbes takes place in Boston in the early 1770s.
• Kane and Abel Jeffrey Archer's novel about rivalry. William Kane is from Boston.
• Karma and Other Stories, short stories by Rishi Reddi
• Last Dance by Lee Grove
• The Last Hurrah by Edwin O'Connor; O'Connor's 1956 account of big-city politics, inspired by the career of longtime Boston Mayor James Michael Curley
• Last Night in Twisted River by John Irving (2009), partly set in the North End
• Little House by Boston Bay by Melissa Wiley
• Looking Backward, utopian novel written in 1887 and set in Boston in 2000
• Love Story by Erich Segal
• Make Way for Ducklings, iconic children's picture book taking place in Boston Public Garden
• A Modern Instance by William Dean Howells
• Murder at Fenway Park by Troy Soos
• Mystic River by Dennis Lehane
• The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri, set largely in Cambridge and Boston, explores the difficulties of Indian-Americans making their homes in America.
• Oh Boy, Boston by Patricia Reilly Giff; The Polk Street Kids take a trip to Boston.
• On Beauty, novel by Zadie Smith (2005), takes place partly in a fictional town outside Boston. Parts of Boston center are visited.
• The Paper Chase, novel by John Jay Osborn, Jr. (1970)
• The Passionate Mistakes and Intricate Corruption of One Girl in America, in which Michelle Tea charts the turbulent adventures in Boston's teenage goth world
• Pickman's Model by H. P. Lovecraft; takes place in Boston
• The Pursuit of Alice Thrift by Elinor Lipman
• Professor Romeo by Anne Bernays
• Rent Girl, Michelle Tea's graphic memoir of sex work in Boston, illustrated by Laurenn McCubbin
• The Rise of Silas Lapham by William Dean Howells
• Run by Ann Patchett is set in modern Cambridge and Boston, and is a novel exploring family and race relations.
• Running Man by Richard Bachman takes place partly in Boston
• The Sarah Kelling / Max Bittersohn mystery series by Charlotte MacLeod
• "The Scarlet Letter" by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• Shutter Island, novel by Dennis Lehane, takes place on a fictional Island on the Boston Harbor
• Small Vices by Robert B. Parker
• The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner; part of the story finds its setting in Boston.
• The Spenser detective novels, by Robert B. Parker
• The Southern Victory Series by Harry Turtledove; has many characters who live in or are from the Boston area.
• Thin Air by Robert B. Parker
• Under Copp's Hilll by Katherine Ayres; Children's story set in 1908
• Unleavened Bread by Judge Robert Grant set partly in Boston
• The Virgin Knows by Christine Palamidessi Moore; sibling rivalry and art theft (from the basements of Harvard's Fogg) set in Boston's Italian North End
• Vital Signs by Robin Cook; Boston is the home of protagonist Marissa Blumenthal
• You Can't Take a Balloon into the Museum of Fine Arts by Jacqueline Preiss Weitzman; a children's picture book about a girl's lost balloon floating past landmarks in Boston.
• Zodiac by Neal Stephenson; an eco-thriller focusing on industrial pollution in Boston Harbor
• Innocence by David Hosp; Boston is the main setting of this thriller/courtroom novel.

Television

A number of popular television series are set in Boston, four of which were notably created by David E. Kelley, who grew up in suburban Boston.

• Ally McBeal, a romantic comedy popular in the late 90s, created by David E. Kelley of Belmont, Massachusetts
• Banacek
• Being Human, a werewolf, a ghost and a vampire share a house in Boston
• The Best Years, Canadian TV show set at a fictional Boston College
• Between the Lines, short-lived TV series based on the movie of the same title
• Boston Common, a comedy about attending a fictional Boston college featuring Anthony Clark
• Boston Legal. A television series centered on a Boston law firm, created by David E. Kelley
• Boston Public. A television series centered on a Boston public school, also created by Kelley
• Cheers, by Charles-Burrow-Charles Productions and Paramount Pictures. A television series centered on a Boston bar, which in reality is the Bull & Finch Pub
• Crossing Jordan, a crime drama, following the lives of Boston Medical Examiner Jordan Cavanaugh and her co-workers
• Dawson's Creek (teen drama 1998-2003). In Season 5 the main characters go to college in Boston.
• Falling Skies. A sci-fi drama set in Boston and the surrounding areas
• Fringe, set in Boston and surrounding area
• Goodnight Beantown. a sitcom dating to 1983
• How High. set at Harvard
• Leverage, set in Boston
• The Paper Chase, based on the 1970 novel and the 1973 film of the same title
• Park Street Under
• Paul Sand in Friends and Lovers A short-lived 1974-1975 situation comedy featuring the titular Paul Sand as a double bass player for the Boston Symphony Orchestra
• The Practice. A television series centered on a Boston law firm, also created by David E. Kelley of Belmont, Massachusetts
• Rizzoli & Isles
• Sabrina, the teenage Witch
• Spenser: For Hire featuring Robert Urich playing the Robert B. Parker character
• St. Elsewhere, a drama series set in the fictional St. Eligius Hospital in Boston
• The Suite Life of Zack & Cody, a comedy show made for the younger audience that takes place in a fictional hotel in Boston
• Two Guys and a Girl
• Unhitched, a series about a group of newly single friends learning the lessons of starting over in their 30s
• The X-Files. In episode "Medusa" (Episode 12 of Season 8), Agents Doggett and Scully investigate suspicious deaths on the Boston subway system.

Film

A number of films have been set in Boston or Greater Boston, many due to the presence of Harvard University in neighboring Cambridge, Massachusetts.

• 21, a fictionalized account of the very-unofficial MIT Blackjack Team
• Altered States, Ken Russell film based on Paddy Chayefsky's novel
• Between the Lines
• Blown Away depicts the Boston Bomb Squad dealing with a mad bomber.
• Blue Hill Avenue, about four childhood friends from Dorchester who grow up to become drug dealers
• The Boondock Saints, about two Irish immigrant brothers in Boston who become vigilantes
• The Boondock Saints II: All Saints Day, the sequel to The Boondock Saints in which the brothers are forced to return to Boston
• The Bostonians
• The Boston Strangler, depicting a famous serial killer, played by Tony Curtis
• The Brink's Job, about the famous robbery of the Brinks security transport in the North End
• Celtic Pride, about two die hard Boston Celtics fans
• Charly, based on Flowers for Algernon, about a mentally challenged man who receives treatment for his disability
• A Civil Action, about several families who attempt to sue a company for dumping toxic waste that gave their children leukemia. Filmed all over Boston, ironically not in Woburn, where it takes place, but in Palmer, Massachusetts.
• Coma is set at the fictional Boston Memorial Hospital.
• The Company Men, starring Ben Affleck, Chris Cooper, Tommy Lee Jones and Kevin Costner
• The Core, an early scene when people with pacemakers mysteriously drop dead during Green World Day. It is later known that the core stopped rotating.
• The Departed, Martin Scorsese's 2006 hit film, takes place in Boston, with prominent use of Boston landmarks and culture. Winner of the Academy Award for Best Picture 2006.
• Dirty Tricks, 1981 film starring Elliott Gould as a Harvard professor involved in an historical crime caper
• Edge of Darkness, the 2010 crime thriller starring Mel Gibson
• The 2005 remake of Fever Pitch, is about a man's obsession with the Boston Red Sox.
• Field of Dreams; Ray Kinsella's journey takes him through Boston to fetch Terence Mann and attend a game at Fenway Park.
• The Forbidden Kingdom, a martial arts comedy-drama about a Boston boy who enters a Chinese fantasy world, with Jet Li and Jackie Chan
• The Firm, a film in which the opening takes place at Harvard
• The Friends of Eddie Coyle, a drama about an aging mob gun runner from Quincy who has to choose whether or not to inform on his Irish Mob friends to avoid jail time
• Fuzz, Detectives from Boston's 87th Precinct's investigating a murder-extortion racket run by a mysterious deaf man
• Gone Baby Gone, directed by Ben Affleck, takes place and was filmed in Boston.
• Good Will Hunting takes place in Boston: the characters live in South Boston, and some other action is set at Harvard and M.I.T.
• The Handmaid's Tale is set in the Harvard Square area.
• Harvard Man, a basketball player strikes a deal with the mob to fix a basketball game.
• Heaven's Gate, exterior Harvard scenes filmed at Oxford University
• Home Before Dark (1958), set in Boston and Cape Cod, is adapted from the novel by Eileen Bassing; original negative is lost.
• Housesitter
• Ice Princess, takes place in Worcester, MA around the Greater Boston area, about a physics geek who dreams of becoming a professional ice skater and gets an offer to go to Harvard but turns down that offer.
• Johnny Tremain, 1957 Disney film based on the same named novel
• Knight and Day, starring Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz
• Knowing
• The Last Detail, about two United States Navy policemen who decide to take out a young sailor for one last night on the town (through Boston's Combat Zone) before he goes to jail
• The Last Hurrah
• Legally Blonde, about a UCLA Valley Girl that attempts to get her boyfriend back by entering Harvard Law School
• Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events, takes place in Boston, as seen on the envelope at the end of the movie. Specifically, "28 Prospero Place, Boston, Massachusetts, USA."
• Little Children, set in a fictional suburb of Boston
• Love Story
• The Matchmaker
• Malcolm X, Malcolm's Boston years are chronicled in this film, including his prison years, which led to his eventual conversion to Islam.
• Mona Lisa Smile, featuring Julia Roberts as a nonconformist Wellesley College professor
• Moneyball, featuring Brad Pitt, has a scene at Fenway Park in Boston.
• Monument Ave., a film about low level Charlestown gangsters dealing with the repercussions that arise due to the code of silence
• My Best Friend's Girl
• Mystery Street
• Mystic River, an Oscar-winning drama about three childhood friends who later reunite after the murder of one of their daughters. Set in a fictional area of Boston called "Buckingham Flats". Filmed in East Boston and South Boston.
• The Next Karate Kid has primary scenes set in the Boston area and was filmed partly in Brookline, MA.
• Next Stop Wonderland takes place in Boston and the MBTA station Wonderland takes special significance.
• Night School
• Now, Voyager
• Once Around
• The Paper Chase a film about a student struggling through Harvard Law School, based on the 1970 novel. (John Houseman won an Oscar for his role as Prof. Kingsfield).
• The Proposal
• Prozac Nation, about a young woman who struggles with depression during her first year at Harvard
• Shutter Island, a thriller starring Leonardo DiCaprio, takes place on an island in Boston Harbor.
• Sacco and Vanzetti, about the famous anarchists convicted of murder
• A Small Circle of Friends, about Harvard in the 1960s and three students bonding together
• Soul Man, a comedy about a man who poses as a black scholarship winner in order to attend Harvard Law School
• Southie, a drama about a man who returns to Southie after leaving for several years to get away from the violence of the gangster life
• The Social Network, a drama about the creation of the popular social networking site Facebook. Many scenes are set on the Harvard campus.
• The Spanish Prisoner
• Starting Over, a romantic comedy starring Burt Reynolds about a recent divorcee who relocates to Boston to restart his life
• Still We Believe: The Boston Red Sox Movie, a documentary chronicling the 2003 baseball season of the Boston Red Sox
• Stonados, a SyFy Channel television movie about Boston being ravaged by a rain of exploding rocks (starting with Plymouth Rock) from a freak meteorological event.
• The Story of Alexander Graham Bell
• Surrogates, a futuristic police thriller starring Bruce Willis
• The Thomas Crown Affair (1968), about a wealthy businessman who robs banks for excitement
• Titicut Follies, a documentary about Bridgewater State Hospital near Boston, and the lives of its mental patients
• The Town, starring Ben Affleck
• Ted (2012), starring Mark Walhberg
• The Verdict, a legal drama about an alcoholic Boston lawyer
• Vig (Money Kings), about an honest man who has to become a bookie
• War of the Worlds, film adaptation of the novel. The film ends with Tom Cruise and his kids finally reaching Boston where his ex-wife lives.
• What's the Worst That Could Happen?, about a rich man who catches a thief burglarizing his Boston home and steals the thief's lucky ring, which the thief then tries to get back
• What's Your Number?, starring Chris Evans and Anna Faris
• Walk East on Beacon!
• With Honors (1994) With Brendan Fraser & Joe Pesci, about a Harvard student (Fraser) who loses the only copy of his thesis, traces it to a basement where it has been found by a homeless man (Pesci) who trades pages of the thesis for food and shelter
• X2: X-Men United, X-Men sequel, in which two scenes take place in Boston. Boston is the home of Bobby Drake, alias Iceman.
• Yellow Lights, a college drama that takes place at Wellesley College as well as a fictional college set in Newton, Massachusetts
• House of the Damned, all of the interior shots were done in the house of the director, Sean Weathers in Brooklyn, NY. However, Weathers wanted a different feel for the exteriors so he and his cinematographer drove to Boston to re-shoot the exteriors months later without the actors.
• Zookeeper, shot at Boston's Franklin Park Zoo

Other

• An unaired episode of the Adult Swim animated television series Aqua Teen Hunger Force, entitled "Boston", makes reference to Boston, as it satires the 2007 Boston bomb scare.

External links

• An annotated bibliography of fiction set in Boston