James Michener was over eighty years of age when his epic book, Alaska, was released. He had been thinking about writing such a work for over forty years. Why did he wait so long? The explanation seems ridiculous, but at age 40, he was afraid he might be too old to withstand the rigors of an Alaskan winter, which hovers at 50 degrees below zero along the Yukon River. His rule had always been never to write about a place in which he hadn't lived. Thus he shied away from this challenging undertaking.

The long years 1947-1984 passed with his often thinking of trying his luck in Alaska and always drawing back with apprehension: "I'm too old." Then irrationally, after a major heart attack and a quintuple bypass and just before his 80th birthday, he thought... "If I'm ever going to do that Alas…