i'm lela kite, i'm your room host for the day. wearing a little weary by time but glad to be here. i'm also chair of the brickle avenue literary society. turn your cell phones off, please. thank you all for coming. let's thank our sponsors. we need to do that in every session, because they are so important to the success of the fair. so big thanks to knight foundation, ohl, the bachelor foundation, the deging ro to ot -- degroot foundation. as always, thank you to all of the friends of the book fair. we hope everybody in this room will be a friend by next year so you can enjoy all the activities that are available for friends during the year. we thank our volunteers, we thank the staff of the book fair and super big thanks to miami-dade college. [applause] okay, thanks to all. [applause] we have a big crowd for a mighty important, prize-winning author, so let me start by introducing his introducer. marsha dunn is a longtime miami resident, and she has been, talk about good examples, a friend of the miami book fair since the very first year. how many of you are founding book fair fr