Cruz gets personal during the book. Here are a few things we learn about the senator from Texas.

1. Cruz watched pornography with Supreme Court justices

Cruz served as a law clerk to then Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist. One day, he was standing behind Rehnquist and Justice Sandra Day O'Connor.

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"We were in front of a large computer screen gazing at explicit, hard-core pornography," Cruz wrote.

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The reason? The court was considering a case challenging a law that regulated online porn. The clerks were older and not well-versed in the Internet, so court librarians set up a tutorial for the justices and their clerks on how easy it was to find porn online. Cruz watched as the librarian typed in the word "cantaloupe," though it was misspelled.

"A slew of hard-core, explicit images showed up onscreen," he wrote. "As we watched these graphic pictures fill our screens, wide-eyed, no one said a word. Except for Justice O'Connor, who lowered her head, squinted slightly, and muttered, 'Oh, my.'"

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2. He went bowling with Bo Derek on Election Day 2000

Cruz worked on the George W. Bush campaign in 2000; it's where he met his wife, Heidi. Cruz's boss, Josh Bolten, was dating actress Bo Derek at the time. Bolten and Derek met at the 2000 Republican National Convention. Bolten also loved to go bowling and took the Bush policy team bowling on election day.

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"At the bowling alley, she bowled barefoot, with two hands, in a white pantsuit," Cruz wrote. "Every man on the policy team was mesmerized."

3. He told a Brown University admissions counselor he was hungover

Cruz spent the night before an interview at Brown University partying with students at Dartmouth College. They drank. A lot. When Cruz's parents picked him up for the drive to Rhode Island, he was in bad shape.

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At a meeting with an admissions counselor Cruz writes, "I had to ask her to please lower her voice because, I told her, I was really hungover. That probably did not leave the best of impressions."

4. Cruz 'burned bridges' on George W. Bush campaign

Cruz wrote that he was "far too cocky for my own good" while working on the George W. Bush campaign and often overstepped his bounds. He thought his job was to provide "the best judgment on the right policies" for Bush, but others thought Cruz was only supposed to channel expertise, not be an arbiter of policy.

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"As a consequence I burned a fair number of bridges on the Bush campaign," he wrote, which cost him a much-desired job in the administration. Because of that, Bush's first year was "one of the hardest of my life," Cruz wrote.

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5. His father wanted to fight with Castro

Cruz often speaks about how his father Rafael was beaten and jailed in Cuba. In the book he writes that his father led a group of insurgents against Fulgencio Batista, was captured and tortured. Cruz's father wanted to slip into the mountains and join Fidel Castro's army, but he was told there was no way to get to the rebels. Instead, he bribed a Cuban official and came to the United States. Cruz's father later returned to Cuba after Castro seized power. Rafael Cruz was appalled that Castro was a communist and renounced him. Rafael Cruz has in recent years made controversial statements including likening President Obama to Castro. Cruz wrote that Rafael's sister later came to the United States by falsifying her passport.

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6. His sister died of a drug overdose

Cruz's father had two daughters from a previous marriage. One of them, Miriam, battled drug addiction and was in and out of prison for years. Cruz wrote that he and his father went to the crack house where she was living in Philadelphia and tried to "talk some sense into her," but she was angry and didn't change. Cruz took out a $20,000 cash advance on his credit card so her son could attend military school. In 2011, Miriam died of an accidental drug overdose.

7. He once wore George H.W. Bush's clothes

Cruz visited former President George H.W. Bush in Kennebunkport, Me., in 2009. Cruz was running for attorney general and wanted to seek out the former president's advice and wisdom. Bush asked Cruz to come out on his boat, but said Cruz's outfit of a suit and tie was so formal. So the former president lent Cruz clothes -- jeans, a shirt and a belt whose buckle read "President of the United States." Cruz was invited by George P. Bush, the son of one of Cruz's rivals for that very job: Jeb Bush.

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8. His wife went through a depressive episode when the couple moved to Texas

Cruz's wife, Heidi, is extraordinarily accomplished. The Harvard Business School graduate has worked on Wall Street, in the White House and at the Department of Treasury. Her career had taken off in 2003, when she was named Western Hemisphere director at the National Security Council. That year, Ted Cruz was offered a job as solicitor general of Texas; he took it and the couple maintained two homes for some time. The following year Heidi Cruz moved to Texas, and it wasn't easy.