conversations.from: human
conversations.value: What could be a title for a book about Daily, Telegraph, Fluent with the genre: Mystery, Thriller & Suspense, Thrillers & Suspense?
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: A title for this book could be 'The Street Lawyer'
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: Do you know a plot for a book titled The Street Lawyer about Daily, Telegraph, Fluent with the genre: Mystery, Thriller & Suspense, Thrillers & Suspense?
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: The Street Lawyer: A homeless man, identifying himself only as "Mister," enters the offices of the powerful WashingtonC.\nlaw firm Drake & Sweeney and takes many of the lawyers hostage while angrily demanding information about some kind of eviction that took place.\nAlthough he is eventually shot and killed by a police sniper and the hostages freed, one of the hostages, an antitrust lawyer named Michael Brock, is concerned by what he has learned and feels compelled to investigate further.\nHe finds his way to the 14th Street Legal Clinic, where he meets Mordecai Green, an advocate for the homeless, who asks him to help one night at a homeless shelter.\nGreen, along with his abrasive but brilliant and committed staff (an idealistic Jewish lawyer named Abraham and a Latina office genius/jack of all trades named Sophia) work to provide legal help to the most downtrodden members of society.\nAs Brock\'s investigation deepens, he finds that his own employer was complicit in an illegal eviction, which eventually resulted in the death of a young homeless family.\nIt involved the sudden approval of a federal building project on the site of a condemned building that had been serving as a rent-payment housing center for formerly homeless families; due to the rent system, these individuals were tenants and not squatters and thus entitled to a full legal eviction/contestment process, but a senior Drake & Sweeney attorney ignored this information because the firm had a large stake in ensuring the federal project start on time, and thus illegally threw everyone out into the freezing winter streets.\nHe takes a confidential file, intending to copy it, but is quickly suspected of its theft.\nShocked by what he has found, Brock leaves his firm to take a poorly paid position with the 14th Street Legal Clinic, which works to protect the rights of the homeless.\nThis leads to the severing of his links to his previous white-collar life, as his already-dying marriage officially ends in an amicable divorce.\nHe later becomes emotionally involved in the case of a woman named Ruby, whose drug addiction led to her losing custody of her son.\nHe also meets a lovely young homeless advocate named Megan and they start a relationship.\nAs Drake & Sweeney comes after Brock with theft and malpractice allegations, the clinic launches a lawsuit against the law firm and its business partners.\nThe firm makes a deal where Brock has his license suspended for a short time, while they settle for a large amount of money and fire the sleazy senior partner whose actions led to the young family\'s death.\nDrake & Sweeney\'s head partner, deeply troubled by the events, offers to make pro bonus staff available to assist the work of the clinic in fighting for the rights of homeless people.\nThe book ends with Brock taking a short vacation with Megan and Ruby, and them reflecting on their lives.
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: Do you know the first five paragraphs for this book?
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: The Street Lawyer
  The Pakistanis didn't bake fruit-filled doughnuts. I bought oatmeal cookies instead, and drove to the office.
  Ruby was asleep in the doorway, and as I approached I wondered how long she had been there. She was covered with two or three old quilts, and her head rested on a large canvas shopping bag, packed with her belongings. She sprang to her feet after I coughed and made noise.
  Nothing productive would come from a conversation with a homeless person about why she slept here or there. Ruby was hungry. I unlocked the door, turned on lights, and went to make coffee. She, according to our ritual, went straight to what had become her desk and waited.
  We had coffee and cookies with the morning news. We alternated stories—I read one I wanted, then one that was of interest to her. I ignored the one about me.
  Ruby had walked out of the AA/NA meeting the afternoon before at Naomi's. The morning session had gone without incident, but she had bolted from the second one. Megan, the director, had called me about an hour before Gasko made his appearance.
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: Delete the last sentence.
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: The Street Lawyer
  The Pakistanis didn't bake fruit-filled doughnuts. I bought oatmeal cookies instead, and drove to the office.
  Ruby was asleep in the doorway, and as I approached I wondered how long she had been there. She was covered with two or three old quilts, and her head rested on a large canvas shopping bag, packed with her belongings. She sprang to her feet after I coughed and made noise.
  Nothing productive would come from a conversation with a homeless person about why she slept here or there. Ruby was hungry. I unlocked the door, turned on lights, and went to make coffee. She, according to our ritual, went straight to what had become her desk and waited.
  We had coffee and cookies with the morning news. We alternated stories—I read one I wanted, then one that was of interest to her. I ignored the one about me.
  Ruby had walked out of the AA/NA meeting the afternoon before at Naomi's. The morning session had gone without incident, but she had bolted from the second one.
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: Do you know four more paragraphs?
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: According to her version of Lontae's last months, she was determined to get off the streets and clean up her life. She eagerly began taking birth control pills, provided by the House of Mary. She desperately wanted to get clean and sober. She attended AA/NA meetings at the center, and fought her addictions with great courage, though sobriety eluded her. She quickly improved her reading skills, and dreamed of getting a job with a steady paycheck to provide for her little family.
  Ms. Cather eventually found her a job unpacking produce at a large grocery store; twenty hours a week at $4.75 an hour. She never missed work.
  One day last fall she whispered to Nell Cather that she had found a place to live, though it must be kept a secret. As part of her job, Nell wanted to inspect the place, but Lontae refused. It wasn't legal, she explained. It was a small, two-room squatter's apartment with a roof and a locked door and a bathroom nearby, and she paid a hundred dollars a month in cash.
  I wrote down the name of Nell Cather, at the House of Mary, and smiled to myself at the thought of her on the witness stand, telling the Burtons' story to a jury.
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: Do you know the last five paragraphs?
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: A strong gust threw mist in our faces, and we squeezed tighter. The chains holding the swing squeaked louder, then faded as we became almost still. We watched the clouds swirl above the water. Time was of no importance.
  Everything and nothing. Away from the city, I could look back for the first time and try to make sense of it all. Thirty-two days earlier I had been married to someone else, living in a different apartment, working in a different firm, a complete stranger to the woman I was now holding. How could life change so drastically in a month?
  In D.C., I found my way to the Washington Legal Clinic for the Homeless, where I met Patricia Fugere, the Director. She and her colleagues—MaryAnn Luby, Scott McNeilly, and Melody Webb O'Sullivan—introduced me to the world of the homeless. Many thanks to them for their time and assistance.
  Thanks also to Maria Foscarinis of the National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty, and to Willa Day Morris at Rachael's Women's Center, and Mary Popit at New Endeavors by Women, and Bruce Casino and Bruce Sanford of Baker & Hostetler.
  Will Denton once again read the manuscript and suggested changes to keep it lawyerly. Jefferson Arrington showed me the city. Jonathan Hamilton did the research. Thanks.