conversations.from: human
conversations.value: Provide a description for a book titled The Low Road about Short, Story, Washington with the genre: Literature & Fiction, Genre Fiction.
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: the author is a two-time winner of the UK's Global Short Story Competition. His stories appear in all four volumes of The Short Story America Anthology. He lives with his wife in Walla Walla, Washington.
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: Add another sentence about Washington, State, Penitentiary, living, helping, manipulating.
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: the author is a two-time winner of the UK's Global Short Story Competition. His stories appear in all four volumes of The Short Story America Anthology. After careers as a poker player and correspondence school salesman, he taught at the Washington State Penitentiary, where he could finally earn a living by helping people instead of manipulating them. He lives with his wife in Walla Walla, Washington.
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: Provide a description for a book titled The Low Road about Karl, Boston with the genre: Biographies & Memoirs.
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: Karl the author has been retired from cab driving for many years. He lives a quiet life in the suburbs south of Boston. He has three children and a grandchild. He enjoys motorcycling, golf, and writing.
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: Provide the first four paragraphs for this book.. End with the sentence '"'.
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: The Low Road
  In a spray of blood and feathers the pheasant was hurled to the side of the road. The man behind the wheel of the passing truck glanced in his rearview mirror. Next to him sat his daughter, hunched down in her seat. She yawned and rubbed her eyes. "What was that, Daddy?"
  Jim McCormack was tired. His son, Charlie, was sick and had spent most of the night throwing up in the bathroom. So Jim had endured the long hours stretched out on the living room couch with a blanket, while his wife tended to the boy. In the dim light Jim had watched the time on the wall clock crawl by, and at 5 AM he sat up, stalked to his daughter's bed, and gave her a shake. "Get up, Anna," he said, "you and me are going hunting."
  Anna was not a hunter. She didn't even have a license, and her experience with a shotgun was limited to one botched session at the skeet-shooting range. The gun's recoil had slammed the stock into her chin and sent her crying into her mother's arms. But Jim wanted to go hunting, and he hated to hunt alone. So Anna would have to do.
  Jim cut the motor, turned off the headlights, and lifted two shotguns from behind the seat. "Zip up your jacket," he said, stepping out of the truck. He pulled some shells from his pocket and slipped them into the trigger mounts of each Remington. Then he handed his daughter a shotgun, and led the way into the woods. "This is your brother's gun," he said. "Treat it like it was your own."
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: Provide four more paragraphs.
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: The beeswax tapers at the sides of the altar were unlit. Tuava-Li took the candle from the desk and went to light the first twelve, which represented the seasons of the moon. The gold leaf on the carvings of the altar shone. There were the Gods, the heroes, the whole, rich tapestry of Elfin life that had unfolded through the millennia, etched into the face of the altar. The wood had been taken from a fallen limb of the first Sacred Tree, so long ago that it was more like stone than wood. "Pray with me, Jardaine," said Tuava-Li, and the pair of them knelt before the altar.
  After many minutes of silence, Tuava-Li opened her eyes. Around the altar wound a ring of vines. Tuava-Li reached for a vessel of sacred oil and poured the precious liquid into a bowl. Jardaine also poured a portion of oil into the bowl, then lit the surface with a candle flame. The fragrant oil swirled in dark curlicues of green. "There is much I need to ask you," Tuava-Li said. "Whilst I was gone, did you have any visions? Did the Mage come to you, as she did to me?"
  Jardaine shook her head. "I did as you asked, Tuava-Li. I stayed here in this place and waited. I sat at the desk and studied, I knelt at the altar and prayed, I lay on the hammock during the nights you were gone and let myself pass through the Gates of Vattar, and the only thoughts I heard were my own. The only messages I received were from the Elves, who are overwhelmed with the work you've asked them to do. You imagine that the Mage is alive and trying to contact you, because you want to believe it so badly. But the Mage is dead, Tuava-Li, and you'd best be ready to take her place now, because the Elves need a leader. If you're not prepared to do it, the Synod will appoint someone who is."
  Tuava-Li felt her chest tighten as Jardaine got up from the floor. "Since you left me in charge, Tuava-Li, I've taken the liberty of making a few changes. If we intend to bring back the rest of our Clan to this place, we'd best make sure 'tis ready. That's why the monks have been meeting by day with the Elves in the fields and the Elves in the Grove, to teach them the spells that will help them get their work done on schedule. We eliminated the dreaming rituals, and shortened our time at the Gates of Vattar by two hours. Tuava-Li, you wouldn't believe how much we've accomplished. The monks and I have been searching the libraries, and we found a formula for a med'cine that will protect us from Human contagion. If we're going to run the risk of being exposed to the Humans, we need to protect ourselves."
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: Delete the last sentence.
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: The beeswax tapers at the sides of the altar were unlit. Tuava-Li took the candle from the desk and went to light the first twelve, which represented the seasons of the moon. The gold leaf on the carvings of the altar shone. There were the Gods, the heroes, the whole, rich tapestry of Elfin life that had unfolded through the millennia, etched into the face of the altar. The wood had been taken from a fallen limb of the first Sacred Tree, so long ago that it was more like stone than wood. "Pray with me, Jardaine," said Tuava-Li, and the pair of them knelt before the altar.
  After many minutes of silence, Tuava-Li opened her eyes. Around the altar wound a ring of vines. Tuava-Li reached for a vessel of sacred oil and poured the precious liquid into a bowl. Jardaine also poured a portion of oil into the bowl, then lit the surface with a candle flame. The fragrant oil swirled in dark curlicues of green. "There is much I need to ask you," Tuava-Li said. "Whilst I was gone, did you have any visions? Did the Mage come to you, as she did to me?"
  Jardaine shook her head. "I did as you asked, Tuava-Li. I stayed here in this place and waited. I sat at the desk and studied, I knelt at the altar and prayed, I lay on the hammock during the nights you were gone and let myself pass through the Gates of Vattar, and the only thoughts I heard were my own. The only messages I received were from the Elves, who are overwhelmed with the work you've asked them to do. You imagine that the Mage is alive and trying to contact you, because you want to believe it so badly. But the Mage is dead, Tuava-Li, and you'd best be ready to take her place now, because the Elves need a leader. If you're not prepared to do it, the Synod will appoint someone who is."
  Tuava-Li felt her chest tighten as Jardaine got up from the floor. "Since you left me in charge, Tuava-Li, I've taken the liberty of making a few changes. If we intend to bring back the rest of our Clan to this place, we'd best make sure 'tis ready. That's why the monks have been meeting by day with the Elves in the fields and the Elves in the Grove, to teach them the spells that will help them get their work done on schedule. We eliminated the dreaming rituals, and shortened our time at the Gates of Vattar by two hours. Tuava-Li, you wouldn't believe how much we've accomplished. The monks and I have been searching the libraries, and we found a formula for a med'cine that will protect us from Human contagion. If we're going to run the risk of being exposed to the Humans, we need to protect ourselves.
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: Provide the last five paragraphs.. End with the sentence ' The Mage and her Apprentice followed, staying close behind.'.
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: From far away the wail of an ambulance siren, and then the urgent honk of a fire truck, drifted on the air. "You see," the Mage said, "the borders of our worlds are in flux. Now the Humans see the fire, and they'll attempt to contain it. Perhaps 'twas the burning houses that got their attention. Everything that happens is a gift, if you see it the right way. Now we must go. Will you come with us, and we'll discuss our bargain at greater length, or will you stay here and wait for the Humans to arrive?"
  The Mage was getting tired, and it took Tuava-Li's intense concentration to help her Master become an owl again. "What about the fire?" Matt repeated.
  And so it was that a Troll, and a Human boy, and his sister hurried into the forest, moving in the shadow of a pair of predatory birds. Through smoldering heaps of blackened foliage they made their way, over burned trunks that blocked the path to a scooped-out gully at the edge of a ruined kingdom that had not survived the attempt of the Mage and her Elves to save it. The entrance to the Cord flapped in the wind that still howled through the ravaged forest.
  The children stood awestruck at the brink, holding hands. The Troll climbed through a ragged tear, beckoning to his friends to follow. "Don't be afraid," he said, "try to keep me in sight!"
  And with that, the children knelt, leaning into the harsh, rushing wind of the Cord, and slipped away. The Mage and her Apprentice followed, staying close behind.