text: Ernest Hemingway dies on page 161 of this 300-page book and so does author Valerie Hemingway's story. For that reason this book merits only two stars. Early in her story of meeting Hemingway in Spain in 1959 at age 19, Valerie is aware of the author's magnetic and dominant personality, "Around him everything came to life....There was an urgency and vitality that...did not ebb."
  
  When she stays focused on the story of Ernest Hemingway, this is an endearing look at the older, struggling Hemingway finding temporary renewal in the freshness of an innocent Irish girl who entered his life during the final drafts of "A Moveable Feast."
  
  But the youthful time spent with the famous writer works against this memoir since she was clearly neither as dedicated a correspondent or note taker as her subject. As a result, her recollections are thin and easily available in other sources such as A. E. Hotchner's "Papa Hemingway." The two years she spent living and traveling with Hemingway through Spain, Paris, Key West, Cuba, and America, share as much space as her weird marriage with Hemingway's strange son, Gregory (apparently the other "bull" referred to in the title). 
  
  It shows the continuing vitality of Ernest Hemingway - even in death and over 40 years later - that a Valerie Hemingway can find a book deal for her meager remembrances of such a great man
  