The best-selling author James Michener started life as a small-town Pennsylvania boy who left his foster-home at the age of 13 to hitch-hike around the country. He was 40 before he decided on writing as a career, prior to which he had been an academic, an editor and a US Navy lieutenant-commander in World War II. His first book, "Tales of the South Pacific", won the Pulitzer Prize and was made into the award-winning film, "South Pacific", and his subsequent novels include "Hawaii", "Chesapeake", "Texas", "The Covenant", "Alaska" and "Caribbean". In this autobiography Michener writes of the people, places and events that have shaped his life.