In Spring 2010, the Dayton Daily News, local libraries, bookstores, colleges, high schools, and more will be promoting Dreamers of the Day as the Big Read book, but you can get a jump on everyone and read it now. http://www.bigread.org/

Mary Doria Russell is a Cleveland author and uses the Little Italy region of ace Cleveland as the home of heiress schoolteacher, Agnes. After serving others her whole life, Agnes starts her own life at age 40 with a trip to Egypt and the Holy Land in 1921. She ends up hobnobbing with Lawrence of Arabia, Winston and Mrs. Churchill, Gertrude Bell, and a handsome German who may be a spy. Russell is a superior writer (Hugo and Pulitzer nominee) and I am glad that she has written at least this one historical fiction book, rather than science fiction, so that a broader audience can enjoy her work. An excerpt:"The public library is like a giant bookstore where everything is free, " I would say. "Nobody will ever tell you to stop learning at the library."