Rating: 
Summary: Extraordinary achievement
Review: I am not particularly interested in Marilyn Monroe [I saw her movies as they came out: many were good] and I have read very little Joyce Carol Oates. But, seeing the author discuss the book on C-Span convinced me to read it and I am glad I did. What many of the other reader reviews failed to mention is that, while this book is certainly "about" Monroe, it is perhaps much more about Monroe's America in the 1930s, 1940s, and 1950s. One can learn a great deal about Southern California during the Depression and World War II from this book; and a great deal about why Americans in these decades [and not only then] yearned for the kind of icon Monroe became. There is one chapter, very brief, on an evening class in poetry the young starlet took at UCLA that is a spare and beautiful portrait of a slice of the academic world at the time and of Monroe's hopes and fears in the class. The writing here, and throughout, is superb. The "voices" often change but all contribute to a reader's embracing of the subject and of this novel as a work of art.
Rating: 
Summary: Oates gives Marilyn depth & intelligence
Review: It is strange that "Blonde" has offended so many Marilyn Monroe fans. I knew little about Miss Monroe before reading "Blonde," and when I put the book down I had a lot of respect for Marilyn. Oates seems anything but "resentful" and "degrading" in her portrayel of of Marilyn. Infact, "Blonde" is probably the only reading material that honors Marilyn enough to make her human. For example, Marilyn was was indeed physically beautiful, and also intelligent and strong but also wounded and desperately alone at times. It's a seemingly insightful, psychologically interesting book. ....Tough book to put down.
Rating:
Summary: an incredible experience
Review: Already a fan of Joyce Carol Oates, when I finished _Blonde_ I almost immediately became a fan of Marilyn Monroe as well. Yes, it is a very long, somewhat foggy fictionalized account of Marilyn's life, but having now read several different biograhpies I see how close to the truth Oates really came. Changing many names (foster parents and producers, for example) and referring to Marilyn's husbands as "The Ex-Athlete" and "The Playwright", Oates nevertheless fills the book with all the people who surrounded Marilyn, and reveals the roles they played in both her desperate need to be loved and her blind ambition to become famous. The best part about this novel is Oates' ability to BECOME Norma Jeane, to get inside of her head and write in the actress' voice in an extremely believable way (hence the sometimes confusing and "foggy" aspect of the narration). _Blonde_ is a very haunting and beautiful work that will always be with me.
Rating: 
Summary: Do we need another retelling of the Marilyn Monroe story? No
Review: The final word: "Blonde" is a muddled, long, overdone novel. Skip it and read one of Oates' better novels instead, such as "We Were the Mulvaneys" or "What I Lived For". I came to "Blonde" with mixed expectations. The novel, nominated for the National Book Award in 2001, was widely panned by reviewers. Now I see why. Oates is a talented and prolific writer, but this novel is an overbaked mess. "Blonde" follows Norma Jeane baker from her childhood as an orphaned (her mother Gladys was in a series of mental hospitals from Baker's childhood on) young girl to her untimely death at the age of 36. In the interim, the reader gets no-holds-barred accounts of Baker's physical maladies, sexual escapades, abortions, and insecurities. And oh yeah, in between the novel recounts the filming of some of Baker/Monroe's famous movies. There is no doubt that Baker/Monroe was a complicated figure. There are times that Oates seems to want to reclaim Monroe as a feminist icon, a woman who lived her life on her own terms and was held back by men from doing so. It doesn't work. Baker/Monroe comes across as fiercely unlikable, easily manipulated, and self-centered. Those who want a Marilyn Monroe biography will be disappointed by the literary stunts that Oates pulls in telling the story (lots of poetry, run-on sentences and liberal use of ampersands (&), which presumably are meant to reflect Monroe's stream of consciousness and confused mental state). Those who want a literary retelling of Monroe's story will also be disappointed by the endlessly graphic descriptions of Monroe's sex life (unclear how much of this is real and how much is fiction) and the difficulty in believing that everyone in Monroe's life was against her. No one comes off well here--not Joe DiMaggio (referred to as the "Ex-Athlete", the novel posits that he physically abused Monroe and was extremely jealous), nor Arthur Miller ("the Playwright", who apparently loved Monroe so much that he smothered her), nor Monroe herself. Monroe was certainly no saint--that much is obvious--but she was smarter than her movies would have us believe, and more serious. This the novel does convey--but that's not enough to slog through 750 poorly-written pages. I read this book because I enjoy Oates' work and am mildly interested in Marilyn Monroe. I was thoroughly unsatisfied on both points and recommend skipping this book.
Rating: 
Summary: A Disgrace
Review: Ok, Don't read BLONDE.If you respect Marilyn.Or, if you respect literature.Or, if you just respect yourself.
Joyce Carol Oates is, dare I say it?, a sick woman.A perverted woman to whom smut and crudeness is 2nd (if not 1st) nature.How does she show this to her family!?Disguising itself as a Blockbuster novel, this book is nothing more than a porn-novel.I swear it is.I'm not being prudish.I can indeed be prudish but here I speak in all honesty.If you are looking for an "adult" novel that drivels on with no meaningful content and plenty of dirty scenes wherin the author lives out her filthiest fantasies on paper, then this is the book for you.
DOn't be fooled by the many many pages, into thinking that all that writing means GOOD writing. If you are a Marilyn fan, skip this.JCO has simply used the fame of MArilyn's name to write a pornographic book that will sell by the truckload. Does Joyce have talent and some clever literacy?Maybe. Maybe the people who claim the book is clever are right to some small extent.
But, basically, this is just pages nad pages of what I have already mentioned. The glimpses inside this book of Marilyn's life and insecurities are surely obligatory pieces that lead to what Oates was really dying to write.What I have aforementioned.Along with a whole lot of fiction. Again, Oates longed to write an, ahem, "adult" novel and used Marilyn Monroe as the central character. If it's really Marilyn you want to read about, I suggest My Sister Marilyn.Her sister respected her.Even writers who didn't know her had some kind of respect for her and for literature.And for themselves.And for theri readers.Not this author. This "novel" is a farce. Rest in peace, Marilyn, if you can. Linda M Rowe
Rating:
Summary: Study of Norma Jean's Life and the Craft of Writing
Review: I chose to read this book because I admire the work of Joyce Carol Oates and I wanted to see how she addressed such a challenging task: writing a fictionalized biography. She succeeded wonderfully! The only criticism is it went on for a couple hundred more pages than perhaps were necessary - or perhaps it would be better said that the last couple hundred pages were less interesting to me... so perhaps a different edit would change my perceptions although it makes sense that Norma Jean's descent into despair would not be as entertaining writing. Nonetheless, I read this entire book in less than a week while running my business, teaching and doing my usual non fiction reading which is quite a testimony to the "page turning" nature of Oates' writing. Definitely worthy of a read and a study of the craft.
Rating:
Summary: Oates gives Marilyn depth & intelligence
Review: It is strange that "Blonde" has offended so many Marilyn Monroe fans. I knew little about Miss Monroe before reading "Blonde," and when I put the book down I had a lot of respect for Marilyn. Oates seems anything but "resentful" and "degrading" in her portrayel of of Marilyn. Infact, "Blonde" is probably the only reading material that honors Marilyn enough to make her human. For example, Marilyn was was indeed physically beautiful, and also intelligent and strong but also wounded and desperately alone at times. It's a seemingly insightful, psychologically interesting book. ....Tough book to put down.
Rating: 
Summary: Classic Oates
Review: I read everything I can get my hands on written by Joyce Carol Oates. Never was a character more suitable for a novel by Oates than Marilyn Monroe. One must remember when reading this novel that, as the author warns, the book is a work of fiction based on the life of Monroe. I was fascinated by the book, but I was both saddened and repulsed by the main character. Oates does a wonderful job of reacreating the fog in which her character lived, but this is often disconcerting for the reader. I've commented that I don't think someone who wasn't an Oates fan would make it through this book. What it did do was make me want to read a nonfiction account of the life of Marilyn Monroe.
Rating:
Summary: Fan-bloody-tastic!
Review: This book is one of the most heart-wrenching novels I have ever read. I had never seen any of MM's movies, and knew basically nothing about her before reading this book... afterward, I went out and rented everything. There is something so empathetic and real about Oates' Marilyn... she's just a normal girl who got caught up in something much bigger than herself. Maybe it's not a good sign for my own sanity that I understood the way Monroe thought, talked, and phrased things. But this book truly brought me closer to this lovely, tragic, modern-day royalty than I ever would have dreamed possible. If you read one book, read this one. It is a powerful, moving testiment to a 1950's woman in a man's world.
Rating:
Summary: ONE OF OATES' BEST
Review: I'm not surprised that a lot of people don't like this book--but then again, most people like a lot of really insipid popular authors who sell a lot more than the wildly talented Ms. Oates. Casting popular opinion aside, I have to say that "Blonde" is an intriguing, haunting book that I have read twice and plan to read again. It got me interested in Marilyn Monroe, a cult figure who I never understood and wondered why other people were so interested in in the first place. Ms. Oates writes in such a way to make MM seem like a real person, with all the faults, insecurities, and demons that we all have to one degree or another. Her writing is flawless, and although the language she uses is often terse and can take some getting used to, she has a mastery of the English language unlike any other contemporary writer I've ever read.
I'd like to encourage you to give "Blonde" and other Oates works a chance--you may pick it up and put it down several times before you finally read it all the way through, but I think you'll find that she is one of the few writers whose work stays with you long after you've finished her books. P.S.-Watch the miniseries "Blonde", although it does no justice to the richness of the book.
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