The last novel by Hemingway to be published

For a quarter century, copies of Ernest Hemingway's last unpublished book, a fictionalized account of his 1953 safari to Africa, sat under seal in two libraries, read only by his relatives, publishers and a few scholars.

Now, "True at First Light," edited by the late author's 70-year-old son Patrick, is ready for publication. "This is it," Charles Scribner III said Monday. "This is the last full-length book he left behind."Scribner's family imprint, which published Hemingway when he was alive and is now part of Simon & Schuster, plans to publish the book next summer, in time for the July 21 centennial of Hemingway's birth.

The manuscript describes leopard and lion hunts, a tribal uprising and the author's efforts to live among the Wakamba people of east Africa. Among its maybe-they're-true, maybe-they're-not tales is an account of the married Hemingway's nuptials to an 18-year-old African woman.

Patrick Hemingway, who was with his father and stepmother on the safari, has said he does not believe Hemingway was involved with the woman but cautioned that he might not have been privy to such knowledge.

"There's always going to be that lingering element of ambiguity, and I think Hemingway would have absolutely adored the joke," Scribner laughed. "Hemingway loved tall stories. Who knows?"