Rating: 
Summary: A marvel of structure, storytelling and human compassion
Review: Yes, it is well known that JCO is a marvelous storyteller, who plays both with structure and voices... and this book proves not only her talent, but also her human compassion.This is the first book about Marilyn Monroe (or rather, her alter-ego, Norma Jeane Baker) that I have seen written by a woman. Obviously, the context, perception and objective are completely different. There is no dazzled look or desperate quest for answers as in other (male) writers books. "Blonde" is grand in scope, in feeling, in rythm. Once it picks up, it does not let go. Nothing short of brilliant, it is a majestic novel that deserves a place amongst the modern classics of literature and yes, it is also a work of passion that is so far away from the grasp of the common readers. This is a NOVEL, not a BIOGRAPHY... and should be read that way... a murder mystery told from the point of view of the victim? A Hollywood chronicle seen from both sides of the screen? A gothic romance between a maiden and her doom? Yes, it is all of that... and so much more. If Ms. Oates returns after almost 20 years to the best seller lists, then it may be a warm welcome. If not, she probably won't care. The statement is already made, anyhow.
Rating: 
Summary: Because She Is Bitter She Writes Without Heart
Review: It makes me very sad to think that Marilyn Monroe is currently being represented by this book and that Joyce Carol Oates is being elevated by the media as some sort of authority on Marilyn Monroe's life. Actually, Joyce Carol Oates has written a boring, messy completely plastic version of Monroe's life and it seems that many critics are bending down to kiss her feet because she's a feminist and has written a lot of books. Many of these critics don't seem to care about the fact that Marilyn was a real, living, breathing, feeling person....and are just trying to jump on Miss Oates politically correct bandwagon. And they're tiptoeing around the fact that "Blonde" seems to have been written by an average student in a high school creative writing class. Worse yet, she never even gets close to who the real Marilyn Monroe was - or any believable human being for that matter. Ms. Oates has said that the important part of her research came from watching Monroe's films. That is easy to believe. Instead of any exploration of a complex woman, she seems to be writing about the jaded exploits of one of Marilyn's movie characters. The blonde of "Blonde" is Sugar Kane from "Some Like It Hot" trapped in a "Valley of the Dolls" version of Hollywood. Ms. Oates has attributed to the character of Marilyn Monroe every stereotype that she was struggling to overcome in her last years. She creates scenes that make her come across as an undesirable basket case. Marilyn was a human being. A mass of contradictions good and bad. "Needy" in some ways but also extremely clever and ambitious. Ms. Oates turns her into a stupid "bleeched" bimbo with laughable ambitions to be intelligent, who writes awful poetry while jumping from bed to bed, speaking in the breathless voice of a backwards child. But Oates has even stripped Marilyn's screen persona of the warmth and sex appeal and humor she always managed to project. This is how Oates has Monroe talk to her first husband: "Oh, Daddy, Daddy, I love you so, Daddy, I'm sorry, I won't be bad again, Daddy, I promise, do you love me Daddy? Do you love me?" This is almost unbearable for a Marilyn fan to read. According to interviews Ms. Oates is trying to pass off this portrait of MM as sympathetic, but she is confusing "sympathetic" with "pathetic." Judging from her writing here Ms. Oates has major issues about sex - at least issues about women having sex with men. The author has almost every male surrounding Monroe unspeakably evil, constantly scorning her, spurning her, tricking her. Inexplicably, these men desire her body but at the same time are repulsed by it. Sure Marilyn Monroe was used by men - as many women in the days before Women's Liberation were. Ultimately, for many reasons, Monroe was tragic, but there was more to Marilyn than a neurotic victim at the mercy of the big bad wolves. She was canny enough to turn the tables and use men to her advantage as well. Marilyn Monroe was used but she was also a master user. In her own way she brought Hollywood to it's knees (in return for being forced to her knees). She was shrewd enough to wear the masks that people expected of her but often used those masks to get what she wanted. Lest we forget she was one of the first of the Hollywood stars to break away from the studio system and start her own production company, the studio had to give in to her demands of director approval in the days when most stars had very little control. Marilyn didn't care about money but actions like this paved the way for the powerful mega-producing stars of today who control their films. In "Blonde," men rape her, beat her, use her, degrade her. Yet this Marilyn Monroe doesn't have the intelligence to defend herself. Ever! She keeps coming back for more. Sex for Marilyn, too, is a disgusting thing as - demonstrated in this scene where she gives oral sex to the President while he conducts business on the phone practically ignoring her. No one owns Marilyn Monroe. Artists have their own version of who she was ( as I do!) but it seems to me they should have some empathy and connection with this particular woman when recreating her. Joyce Carol Oates - as esteemed as she is - simply does not understand Marilyn Monroe. Worse she disregards facts and makes up fictions to support her (wrong) version of who Marilyn was. Certainly a writer doesn't have to have the same experiences of the characters they are writing about, but if you're attempting to fictionalize a famous person's life, readers gotta hope that the author has some understanding of the essence and character of the person they're writing about. Even if it's fiction the writer should put the character in fictionalized situations that were likely to happen....help describe the soul and personality of the character. Marilyn delighted in her beauty from an early age. She wasn't ashamed of being beautiful or of being sexual. She enjoyed it. It's what made her feel loved. She strove to be recognized for more - but never regretted being a turn on. Oates, it seems, wants to punish her for this. Judging from the author's photo on the back jacket, Miss Oates - complete with Kewpie-doll painted on lips and martyred expression - probably was never known for beauty or sex appeal. That's not a crime, but "Blonde" seems to be her subconscious revenge on a woman whose beauty and sex appeal has elevated her to modern-day Cleopatra status. "Blonde" is an example of an author who may be fascinated by her subject, but mistakes that fascination for understanding. Well, Ms. Oates is just another exploiter cashing in on the Monroe name and legend. If Oates title character in this piece of trashy fiction was named Frieda Schlepwasser instead of Marilyn Monroe it would already be on the mark-down bins.
Rating:
Summary: Embarrassing performance
Review: It seems that Joyce Carol Oates wants it both ways--to have her readers believe (as per her interviews)that Norma Jeane actually guided her hand while she was writing this book (really odd!), and at the same time thwart criticism for irresponsibly trashing the great star's life by claiming that it's "just fiction." To say that Marilyn Monroe would admire this fictive rendition of her life is absurd. Who would like to have thrown at them all the erotic humiliations that Oates imagines for Monroe? Beyond all that, some wonderful writing might justify her approach, but this is writing at its worst, as the Kirkus reviewer noted ("one of the worst novels ever written"), it is a truly badly written novel. Did Oates bother to read it over after she'd finished it? There are pages and pages here that read like a rough first draft. The book is loaded with Symbols, not well delineated characters; and all the typographical quirkiness annoys, as do the terrible poems that Oates attributes to her character of Norma Jeane. All of this amounts to a trashy performance that will certainly not serve the author's reputation well. It's an endless book, too, and I kept reading only because I wanted to see how bad it could remain, and the ending sustained the level of the rest--pages and pages of messy exploitation.
Rating:
Summary: Myth, personality, and literature as creative acts
Review: The urgent prose rhythms of Joyce Carol Oates' Blonde echo the breathless, bewildered, and vulnerable sound of Marilyn's own public voice in this exploration of how individual personality and mythic personae are fashioned, whose interests they serve and betray, and how they can lose control of themselves and one another in dangerous entanglement. Oates is a master of our language who has found a compelling style to sharpen her vision of the blonde who was not blonde, a goddess who was not a goddess, a woman overcome by femininity, in a Life that is not a Biography. Still another fine achievement in Ms. Oates' remarkable career as a craftsman in every literary genre.
Rating:
Summary: A reckless, extreme exercise
Review: I read in an interview with her that J.C.Oates claims that during the writing of this novel, she came to know what it was like to be Norma Jeane, and felt Norma Jeane's hands guiding her to write this novel. Not only is that very strange, but it is certainly extreme, to blame Norma Jeane for writing this really scurrilous novel about herself. Yes, it's a novel, and not to be taken as biography; but Oates uses Monroe's name and plays coy with other real people in her life (the Playwright, etc.) How would she respond if a similar novel appeared using her name, and exporing, judgementally, the most intimate aspects of her life? Aside from all that, if the novel were a masterful literary creation, as her abusive fans keep claiming it is, insulting anyone who thinks otherwise, then all could be tolerated. But it isn't even a good novel; some of the prose reads like a first draft, not even read through by the author after she typed it, repetivie and convoluted. There are good passages throughout, but they're smothered in verbiage, pseudo-lyric passages that are undecipherable, especially those attributed to a contrived "Actor's Manual." As to the content: The obsessive references to Monroe's odors (or those of the character Oates names Norma-Jeane/Marilyn-Monroe), her bodily functions, the constant sexual denigration of her--all signal a somewhat vengeful detestation of her own protagonist, not the claimed compassion. Certainly Norma Jeane would not have encouraged J.C.Oates to write those passages (invented though they are) while using her name. What remains is what others have indicated, and exposed themselves to attack for pointing out, that the name of Marilyn Monroe sells. The whole matter of invasion of another's life in such a reckless, hostile manner (fictionalized or not, but using an actual name) is sad, really sad.
Rating: 
Summary: Another misfire from JCO
Review: I'm am a very big fan of JCO. I've read them all and I have tosay that Blonde is a huge dissapointment in everyway especially aftera lame Broke Heart Blues. The character of Marilyn is just a cookie cut out from her previous novels. Another woman excessing about bodily fluids and functions and being a poor abused waif. I didn't find the story compelling or interesting even though it was about Marilyn. I'm not sure if this book was a ploy for JCO to get more readers by writing a story about a popular person. New readers I';m sure will wonder what all the hype was about. Here was a missed chance for JCO to get the acclaim she deserves. Blonde for me, will be the last book I buy automatically before a review. I wish she had spent her time writing a novel that made her explore her many talents as a writer. END
Rating: 
Summary: Mystery: Reader Date Rape
Review: Oates is an accomplished author whose metier is the short story. She isn't much fun to read. Those who find beauty and truth most easily in the shimmer of tears seem to adore her. The rest of us, however, find her simply dull and strident. Which is too bad. Her politics cramp her ability to do much other than weep or rail at the injustices of a cruel and indifferent world. It is also somewhat surprising that a woman who travelled as far as Norma Jean did, and who died so long ago, still manages to generate any interest at all. However, this stranger remains a powerful icon for many. Less difficult to understand is the desire of readers to find resolution or escape from the problems we face, in our much less glamorous lives, in the pages of biographies of the famous and powerful. Mystery lovers share many of these same desires and normally open a book seeking pleasure, not polemics. Oates ruthlessly exploits and violates these expectations with the brutality of a zealot, but puts the unconvinced to sleep. In this, Oates joins a long list of mercenary critics who have callously stepped up to the corpse and used Norma's legendary chest as drum upon which to bang out their own rendering of our imagined sins. True believers and fellow travellers will likely forgive the excesses, treasuring alike the odd nugget and fool's gold to be found gleaming in another seemingly endless retelling of this sad, familiar story.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent!
Review: I have been reading Joyce Carol Oates for almost thirty years and have consistenly been amazed with her flexibility with different genres. I am about half-way through "Blonde" and I love it. People, loosen up.....it's fiction. Ms Oates makes no bones about it. This is her interpretation of a life and events in that life. Good Grief, you'd think she were some kind of threat to some of these people reviewing this book. Marilyn Monroe was the greatest creation of them all.....do you think she wouldn't appreciate what Ms Oates has done? Folks, read this. It might shake you up a bit....but somehow, the "feel" rings true.
Rating:
Summary: Fabulous!
Review: Oates is incredibly talented, and BLONDE is as engrossing and intense as novels come. A tour de force of Monroe's all-to-brief life. I loved every single second of this novel. Brava, Ms. Oates!
Rating:
Summary: A great novel from a writer at her peak
Review: It's interesting that Oates always seems to attract abuse and criticism from clearly envious, untalented writers. Not all her works match her best, of course, but BLONDE is a masterwork, and I found not a single sentence that didn't have its own complex logic. This immense novel is a structural work of genius, and Oates's empathy with her subject--who is, remember, a fictional character suggested by a real-life actress, not a biographical portrait--is reminiscent of earlier female portraits like Maureen in THEM (winner of the National Book Award) and Elena in DO WITH ME WHAT YOU WILL. Don't listen to the carpers or the silly keepers of the historical Marilyn's flame (you can tell by the quality of their own writing how insightful they aren't). BLONDE is an artwork that constitutes a major critique of our culture and of the 20th century.
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