Rating: 
Summary: A triumph of story telling -- not for the narrow minded
Review: I think any so-called Marilyn Maven should possibly steer clear of this grandiose novel, because most probably he/she (but mostly "he", I guess) will end up feeling slighted, offended or down right upset. Why? Because in this novel, Joyce Carol Oates (author of such fabulous novels as "Bellefleur", "Them", "Expensive People" and "My Heart laid bare") paints a portrait that is painful and disturbing to see... in here Marilyn Monroe not as Mailer's Goddess, but as a woman who was a victim of herself and of the greed of others.This is one of the best novels I've read in years. But it's sad that it will be maligned by narrow-minded people who think they know it all about Marilyn, and probably should try their hands on outwritring this outstanding masterpiece by one of our foremost writers.
Rating: 
Summary: Sad Violation
Review: .... I have read Ms. Oates' novels before, and although I'm nota fan, I've enjoyed some of her writing. Not this novel. It is astartling study in grotesque extremity. The character (yes, fictive) of Norma Jeane is devastating. I have seldom felt that a writer detested her character more than Ms. Oates does here. She seems to want to rake her through the mud, and does, with overwrought sexual fantasies of humiliation (some of which made me put down the book before I could resume reading it to see how far it would go). The men are all vile; the women are all deranged. There are some great novels with despicable characters, but they are superbly written. This is simply a very badly written book.... There are sentences and passages that make no sense, no matter how you try to figure them out. As to the matter of the real Marilyn Monroe. Ms. Oates insists on pointing out she's a fictional character here and that that allows her to do whatever she wants. Yet she's spoken about feeling she is the only one able to tell her story from "inside." The fact of the matter is that the movie star (I'm not a fan of hers, though I like some of her performances) is clearly violated. A paradox: Ms.Oates writes about her character's violation and ends up violating her more, providing a portrait of a woman crippled by her beauty and sensuality. The real Marilyn Monroe was very beautiful, clearly, and it is possible that that fact, more than any other, has aroused much retributive envy, in this novel and in reactions to it. Clearly Marilyn Monroe had a troubled life. But Ms. Oates puts her character named after the real Norma Jeane through a further purgatory. And that is very sad.
Rating:
Summary: A breathtaking epic on America's foremos myth
Review: This book is absolutely gorgeous; its prose is pristine and clear. Themassive size nonwithstanding it goes quickly (much more than one wouldexpect) and the narrative is spellbinding. It was to be expected that hard core MM fans would cry out in outrage at this effort. But you should try to read this novel (for it is just that, an author's fictionalized interpretation of a certain event) with an open mind. It is not feminist nor Gay bashing and I agree with the reviewer from Mexico, there is much more to this book than what meets the eye. Fans who think they may know it all about Marilyn Monroe possibly should avoid this book.... they take no notion of the exemplary career of Miss Oates. As a reader, you have to make up your own mind, but this book is nothing less than a most breathtaking Epic (in scale) effort of modern fiction, and no one can dispute that with any other argument....
Rating:
Summary: One of the best books I've ever read.
Review: Blonde is one of the best novels I have read in many years of enthusiastic and ecclectic pageturning. I can't think of a work that provides a more intelligent and morally sober insight into human nature, the essence of America, Hollywood and the fabric of modern lives. Joyce Carol Oates is often hated by either frustrated, envious wannabe writers for her success, her tremendous energy and her apparent inmunity to writer's block (good for her, and good for her readers). Others hate her precisely because she courageously displays all those elements in human nature and in our society we hate to hear about and refuse to even look in the eye. Most of her critics are angry, hostile to a personal level and violent in the most infantile, obvious way. This book is not a feel-good cartoon, a fairy tale of "winners" and "positive thinking" or any such thing. It is a painful and often disturbing look at ourselves, at our innermost fears and longings. In using the icon of Marilyn Monroe, Oates provides us with the quintessential 20th century myth of society based on a mass media religion. The fictional Norma Jeane is nothing but a vessel that allows us to look at the world from the other side of that mirror and understand us, and the very essence of that world we like to believe we live in, better. The novel, despite its harrowing intensity, is a fascinating ride, compelling, superbly written and perversely entertaining. It is a moving, profound experience that takes you in a trip into the author's soul and back to yours, changed, touched and grateful. It is exactly what I hope to find in great literature, to lose myself in an entire universe that not only entertains me and thrills me, but enlights me and allows me to learn something about myself and the world I live in. If you like to read with an open mind and an open heart, if you like to be challenged rather than pandered to, if you like art and literature to convey a world of many dimensions, aesthetic and moral, rather than the numbing placid muzak of lite entertainment, I believe you will enjoy this astouding novel as much as I did, and I full heartedly recommend it to you.
Rating:
Summary: intense
Review: I have to say that I have never been a big fan of Marilyn's. I mean she was beautiful but she couldn't act and her movies sucked.MAYbe it's becase she was before my time I don't know, but I've never been a big fan, so the only reason I even started this book was because of my girlfrend's strong reccomendation. Boy, was she ever right.this is just a very good book. You get mad at Marilyn, you laugh with her,cry with her, fall in love with her,in short this book has it all.After having read only non fiction for a few years, I have just read three amazing books, this one along with O'dell' 'Back Roads' and Brauner's 'Love songs of the tone deaf' is proof that there are some (though few and far between)brilliant wriers working today. Read this book, you'll love it.
Rating:
Summary: Long, unrevised draft
Review: I've read Joyce Carol Oates before and admire some of what she's written. But is it possible that she now believes everything she writes, no matter how unrevised and unpolished, will be published and that her loyal fans will buy and praise it? This novel is shockingly badly written, like an excessively long first draft. The characters rely for whatever "life" they have on the real-life people whose names Oates uses or suggests. Yet she wants to separate herself from "biography." Then why not invent names? If this is a "masterpiece," every issue of the Enquirer contains at least one, but not quite as salacious or as clumsily written. I finished it because I kept thinking it might start making sense (much of it doesn't), but after page after page, it remains the same, and I started wondering what Oates would think if someone wrote a novel using her name and attached all kinds of made-up vulgarities--and then kept reminding, `It's just fiction, just fiction!' Yes, this is a fictive "Norma Jeane," but it's admittedly modeled after the real one (Oates seems to want her novel seen both ways), and Oates has managed to make Monroe into a boring characater. Sad to see a writer of her reputation put out a novel this questionable.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent!
Review: This is a great novel. Skillfully written, fantastically plotted. The people whohave mindlessly aggravated it, are either biased or have not finished the book. It is massive but it is well worth the time. Joyce Carol Oates is a Master!
Rating: 
Summary: Almost 40 years after her death, Marilyn still makes sparks.
Review: I'm amazed at the variety of reactions "Blonde" has sparked. I'm not sure whether most of them are reactions to Joyce Carol Oates (why are so many people furious at her? Is it jealousy because she may be the only human on earth who suffers from absolutely no writer's block and can crank out one thought-provoking novel after another?)or is it the cult of Marilyn Monroe, the unknowable icon? At any rate, let's look at the book. It is grim. The writing is very fine, and Norma Jeane never, never gets a break. The result: a sad read, probably pretty much like her life. The question is, do you want to go through it with her? I did, but found "Blonde" terribly disturbing and terribly depressing. We learn nothing new about Norma Jeane or Marilyn Monroe, but do get an idea about how she put up with her life for as long as she did and why she finally brought it to an end. Feminist? Gay-bashing? (see earlier reviews). Hardly. The pain on all sides in this book makes it very hard to take.
Rating:
Summary: Massive disappointment
Review: I had never read a book by Joyce Carol Oates, but I had heard of her, and, now, with the publication of this book, there's been a lot of publicity, so I decided this would be the book to read. I read it with anticipation. The anticipation soon waned, and slowly turned to disappointment, until, into the book, it all changed to embarrassment, as if somebody was asking you to look into the most intimate parts of another person's life, violated. I kept reminding myself that this was only a novel, and that that means fiction, but the name of Marilyn and Norma Jeane kept pulling it back to her, no matter what. I couldn't believe how sloppy the writing was, and I wondered if this could possibly be the writer I've heard praised. Is this an exception, something she published to get in on the Marilyn bandwagon? (Poor Marilyn! The book made me feel sorry for her.) Another matter: Two gay characters, main characters, are portrayed as being mean, cruel, instrumental in Marilyn's despair before her death. Why did Oates invent them and give them such a horrible role? There weren't two such people in Marilyn's real life. There's also a grotesque drag-queen who does a vile erotic imitation that wouldn't even be possible at the time of Oates' novel. Does Oates have a problem here? Marilyn has a lot of gay fans. Oates has a right to express her views, certainly. Still, this is a really crass novel that offends both its subject (even if only a "character" named Norma Jeane) and the reader.
Rating:
Summary: A marvel
Review: I don't get what's the deal with all these reviewers posting puerile personal attacks on Oates. This hatred, frustration and total lack of understanding of what this wonderful writer is all about baffles me. I guess there's some sort of secret society of frustrated, sad and angry fellows out there playing with voodoo dolls of Joyce Carol Oates. If you're one of these ulcerated oates haters, don't waste your time here, don't torture yourself with yet another Oates novel. All the qualities that have made her one of the best writers around, for 30 years, are here in truckloads. She's on top of her game and, the way I see it, this book blows out of the shelves any other title currently on the market big time. It is a work of genius, deliriously entertaining, insightful and packed with emotional and intellectual resonance. It reads like a timeless classic, a beautiful and often sad and tragic meditation on the public/private lives of women and of us all in this society, it displays the banality, cruelty and often absurdity of the fall traps we sucumb to and offers a rich mosaic of characters, of the very fabric of life, all of it filtered by a compasionate, inteligent and mesmerizing storyteller. Blonde is not about Marilyn, it is about JCO as a woman, and about us, the souls trapped in the wasteland. I can't recommend it highly enough.
|
