Book 2: 1930

[Kenneth New]

At the beginning of the year, unemployment continues to rise but the reality of the Depression won't set in until the summer of 1930.

1930 Calendar

Wikipedia Entry for 1930

[Kenneth New]

Monsters in Manhattan

This story begins on January 4th, 1930. The characters have returned to Ibis House in preparation for the start of the spring semester on January 6th.

Having enjoyed a day of fun, but freezing, amusement at Coney Island, the characters are forced (due to a mechanical failure in the subway) to take a bus back to Manhattan. They decide to walk by the apartment Gino di Canzio's family lives in and notice some goblin's watching the building. Going inside, they manage to drag the story out of Gino's brother Carlo.

Carlo and Lorenzo had taken a job to deliver some crates of what they assumed was liquor or drugs from the docks in Brooklyn to Elzar Dalgrip in the upper west side of Manhattan. While driving through the park, they were assaulted by armed men belonging to the Volpe gang. They wrecked the delivery truck and had to flee the scene. They know that Dalgrip will be angry. They know that he's a very bad man, but they don't know that he's a goblin.

The characters confront the goblins and convince them to take them to see Dalgrip, who prefers dealing with mages to mundanes. Dalgrip explains that the delivery truck contained heroin (which he uses to make potions) and several crates with magical beasts whose parts he also plans to use in his potions. He tells the characters that he will let Carlo and Lorenzo di Canzio live, if they can retrieve his magical creatures for him. Otherwise, he plans to vivisect the two young men and sell their parts to a goblin surgery that caters to very rich men who need transplants. [Obviously goblin surgical techniques far surpass those of humans in this era.]