I got lucky. Winter was approaching and a friend's sister needed someone to look after her place in Little Italy. I had that perfectly portable occupation, the writing of a screenplay, which I might as well do in New York as anywhere else. I knew I'd probably fall in love, and I did. Head over heels.



A few months later I was back in Dublin, a little dazed, wondering if New York has forever ruined me for other cities. I still haven't quite figured it out.



Conor Horgan, November 2012



From the foreword by Quentin Fottrell: 'New York is a city of extremes: the home of freaks and geeks, supermodels and actors, stockbrokers and dancers, hipsters and health fanatics. Is that hazy black-and-white figure Jean Butler in flight at her dance studio? Yes, it is. With so much to offer, it’s a place where you never have to grow old. And, yet, it’s crawling with rats, cockroaches and bed bugs. To live here, it helps to be a little bit crazy. Conor captures this eccentricity with no small amount of affection. The MTA conductor peering out of a subway train looks like an animated Pixar character. He does not seem quite real in his befuddlement. But look closer. He has a sardonic expression suggesting that he knows something – a lot – that we don’t.'