conversations.from: human
conversations.value: What could be a title for a story about Kirkus, Reviews with the genre: Children's Books, Animals?
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: A title for this story could be 'City of Dogs'
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: Give me the first five paragraphs for this story.
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: City of Dogs
  I am not a people person, I am a dog person. This means that I am much more comfortable around dogs than people. Always. People make me nervous: they are complicated and unpredictable. Dogs are rarely either. I understand dogs, and they understand me. Dogs have shaped how and what I love; they have defined my career and continue to inspire and comfort me every day.
  When Ken asked me to join him on this project, I knew that I would love meeting and photographing forty New York dogs, but what surprised me was the powerful friendship and instant bond that I often felt with our human subjects.
  I grew up in Central Pennsylvania, but New York was always "the City." My parents would load us up into our station wagon and drive to a Midtown hotel, leaving behind a houseful of cats, hermit crabs, tropical fish, and one single Samoyed for a temporary life of museum hopping and side trips to FAO Schwarz and Creative Playthings. Our home was full of pets; our city adventures were completely absent of them.
  Later, as an adult living in the East Village, my understanding of my community was completely transformed when I adopted Brando, a brindle mystery dog who was simultaneously more than I could handle and everything I needed. With Brando, I had explored the city beyond our own territory, walking west to Greenwich Village or south to the Financial District or north, along the East River, to the United Nations. How had I managed a life in the city without a dog?
  We moved to Florida, and then Mississippi, and finally New Orleans, collecting a few dogs into the pack at each stop. Like many New Yorkers, when I left, I never intended to come back. Leaving New York City is like leaving your most intense, dysfunctional lover or your most disappointing best friend. By the time you finally leave it, you know it is for good. And then something lures you back. For me, it was a variety of things—and losses—that made the return seem inevitable. Two close friends died unexpectedly, and both of my parents, and then Brando, who had always been the one piece of New York that was at my side.
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: Give me two more paragraphs.
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: Then lunch is served, and men and dogs get to spend time with the families and girlfriends who have come to visit. Ohana's handler doesn't have any family here, so the two of them leave the lunch tables and sit together, alone, on the empty bleachers on the other side of the gym. When the signal is given, it is time for the visitors and the dogs to leave the inmates behind. The staff from Animal Farm Foundation gather up the dogs and are escorted down the halls and through the series of locked security gates, past the metal detectors, out into the parking lot. At each gate, the dogs' excitement grows. They pile onto laps in the car, pass over the bridge that connects the island to Queens, and they are free.
  A walk to Washington Square confirms Alistair's status: you know you live among dog people when the folks on the street first make eye contact with and say hello to your dog before, perhaps, raising their gaze to greet you, too. Once they have passed through the arch, Alistair takes a quick dip in the fountain and Elizabeth follows. A crowd of tourists circles, phones outstretched, not for a moment considering that what they are doing might be a bit odd, because Alistair is a mesmerizing presence. On the way back home, there's a stop in a tiny espresso bar, where Alistair suddenly seems enormous, and after some polite conversation his admirers notice that Elizabeth is there, too.
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: Delete the first sentence.
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: Ohana's handler doesn't have any family here, so the two of them leave the lunch tables and sit together, alone, on the empty bleachers on the other side of the gym. When the signal is given, it is time for the visitors and the dogs to leave the inmates behind. The staff from Animal Farm Foundation gather up the dogs and are escorted down the halls and through the series of locked security gates, past the metal detectors, out into the parking lot. At each gate, the dogs' excitement grows. They pile onto laps in the car, pass over the bridge that connects the island to Queens, and they are free.
  A walk to Washington Square confirms Alistair's status: you know you live among dog people when the folks on the street first make eye contact with and say hello to your dog before, perhaps, raising their gaze to greet you, too. Once they have passed through the arch, Alistair takes a quick dip in the fountain and Elizabeth follows. A crowd of tourists circles, phones outstretched, not for a moment considering that what they are doing might be a bit odd, because Alistair is a mesmerizing presence. On the way back home, there's a stop in a tiny espresso bar, where Alistair suddenly seems enormous, and after some polite conversation his admirers notice that Elizabeth is there, too.
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: Give me the last five paragraphs.
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: Zak is such an essential support system, he even sometimes goes along on Keren's auditions. But he doesn't help run lines as she prepares script; "I send him out to walk with friends," she admits. "Momma has to get in the zone."
  Chaos was a birthday gift from Nicole's husband, George, because he was worried about her being able to get around on her own. He was her first dog, and she immediately fell in love. If anyone asked George why he chose a pit bull, the answer was, essentially, why not? He'd known pit bulls his entire life.
  St. Mary's Park is thirty-five acres of elevated parkland in the most densely populated part of the Bronx, but for years the facilities have been in disrepair. Now, thanks to advocacy by people like George and Nicole, there are plans for a major overhaul, including improvements for dog owners.
  But such conflicts aren't typical. Residents here are so devoted to their community that few of them left even during Hurricane Sandy, when virtually every home was flooded, some with as much as ten feet of water. Since then they have rebuilt, but one can still see the remnants of the reconstruction. Across the street, a cat is napping on the top rung of a ladder into an empty aboveground swimming pool. That's not officially its home, but it stays there anyway. Down the street, a neighbor reports that her dog has been getting visits from another wandering cat that knows to knock on the downstairs door, where the dog will let it in. At the end of the day, she comes home to find the pair snuggling. It is a beach community that way, even in winter, with boundaries casually and continually crossed, so word traveled fast when Bear passed away shortly after these photos were taken.
  In a city of eight and a half million people, it might seem as if the passing of a single dog would go without notice. But we notice every one, even those whose names we never learned. Their presence, their routines, their barking and begging and kissing and playing, all become part of the rhythm of the city and it skips several beats when they are gone.