Excerpt: Mitt Romney's 'No Apology: The Case for American Greatness'

Feb. 1, 2011 — -- Former Massachusetts governor and Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney has written "No Apology: The Case for American Greatness," in which he discusses America's role in international politics.

Read an excerpt from the book below, then check out some other books in the "GMA" library.

I hate to weed. I've hated it ever since my father put me to work weedingthe garden at our home in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan. It was plantedwith zinnias, snapdragons, and petunias, none of which seemed to grow asheartily as the weeds. After what seemed like hours of work, I never couldsee much progress, and I'd complain to my dad. "Mitt," he would reply,"the pursuit of the difficult makes men strong." It seems now like an awfully grandiose response for such a pedestrian task. I complained about the weeding often enough that I heard his homily regularly. I'm sure that's why it sticks with me to this day.

My father knew what it meant to pursue the difficult. He was born inMexico, where his Mormon grandparents had moved to escape religiouspersecution. At five years old, Dad and his family were finally living prettywell. They had a nice home and a small farm, and Dad even had his own pony,called Monty. But in 1911, Mexican revolutionaries threatened the expatriate community, so Dad's parents bundled up their five kids, got on a train, and headed back to the United States. Their furniture, their china, his mother's sewing machine — everything they had worked hard to accumulate — had tobe left behind. Once back in the States, they struggled. They moved timeand again, and work was always hard to find. My grandfather established aconstruction business, but he went bankrupt more than once. Dad used toregale us kids with claims that one year in Idaho his family lived on nothingbut potatoes — for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

Dad began to contribute to the family's income early on. During hishigh- school years he worked long hours as a lath- and- plaster man, finishingthe interior walls of new houses. He never was able to put together enoughtime and money to graduate from college.