- Hardcover: 448 pages
- Publisher: JR Books Ltd (25 Sep 2010)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 1906779279
- ISBN-13: 978-1906779276
- Product Dimensions: 23.6 x 16 x 3.6 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 235,317 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Review
‘A major new biography’ (Daily Express 201102)
Product Description
Marilyn Monroe was a movie legend, starring in films such as The Seven Year Itch, Some Like It Hot and, in later years, The Misfits, with Clark Gable. In 1962, this beautiful star died, legend has it from suicide. There have been many takes on the life of Marilyn Monroe but in this exceptional, highly-surprising, painstakingly researched book, Keith Badman has uncovered long-lost (or previously unseen) receipts, invoices, cuttings, files, interviews, eye-witness accounts, as well as notes that reveal the details of Marilyn Monroe's last days, and how the reality of her last two years has never fully been told. After five years of highly-meticulous research, Badman is now able to reveal the unequivocal truth about how she died and the cover-up that ensued, as well as the reality behind her rumoured 1962 remarriage to Joe DiMaggio, her final (ultimately unfinished) movie, Something’s Got To Give, her jealousy of film legend, Elizabeth Taylor, her romance with the singer, Frank Sinatra, the night she sang for JFK, her deplorable July 1962 weekend at Sinatra’s Cal-Neva lodge, how she was fleeced, financially by some of her supposed best-friends, her final week alive (who she saw, where she went, who she spoke to) and her well-known, “Say goodbye to the President,” farewell message, as well as much, much more, including her time with John and Bobby Kennedy. Using private, previously unpublished itineraries and original eye-witness accounts, Badman is able to make public, in hard-core detail, just how deeply she was involved with them and reveal the precise date of Marilyn’s very first encounter with the President, thus ending the five-decade-old mystery. Badman reveals Marilyn as never seen before; the result, a deluge of stories and facts that even some of Monroe’s most die-hard fan will be unaware of. For those who think they know all about her concluding years, be prepared to think again. About the Author Keith Badman is the author of eight, highly-acclaimed biographies. Accolades for his work include…The Beatles After The Break-Up (1999): “An awesome piece of scholarship…a bible,” (New Musical Express); The Beatles Off The Record (2000): “Compared with some of The Beatles’ later selective and polished or faulty and fading memories, this is much nearer the truth,” (The Beatles' official biographer, Hunter Davies); The Beach Boys – The Definitive Diary Of America’s Greatest Band On Stage And In The Studio (2004) … Endorsed by Beach Boys genius, Brian Wilson, “Badman’s book is a fine piece of work, painstakingly researched and compiled…This is surely to become the pre-eminent guide to one of music’s most influential bands…Badman’s book ranks among the very best.” (Website Nightmares.com). (20101005)
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
13 of 13 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
I've never written a book review for Amazon before but have just finished reading this book and I had to write and say how good it was! I'm a big Marilyn Monroe fan, have been for years and have read a few of her biographies but this book had details I had never read about before and just made the last few years of her life so real and jump out so vividly from the pages, I couldn't put it down. I've read so many different things about Marilyn it's hard to know what is true any more but this author has done his research and spent his time separating the fact from the fiction. If you are a Marilyn Monroe fan and want to know more about her you will not be disappointed, for example I never knew that she hated Los Angeles, detested the place and thought of New York as her real home. Or that she had planned to spend 6 weeks in New York in August and September of 1962 and her 'housekeeper' Eunice Murray was closing up her LA home the weekend that she died, in preparation for Marilyn leaving for New York the following week. I thought I knew a lot already but this book had so much new information. Even though we all know what happens in the end, it's so sad because reading this book you can see Marilyn still had so much to live for and that at the core of it all, she was just another human being seeking happiness and so many of the key characters and so called 'friends' in her life let her down at the very end.
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
When I buy a new book about Marilyn I'm hoping it will bring me a bit nearer to the person that Marilyn really was. This new book, for all its interesting circumstantial detail, was disappointing in this repect. By the end I felt that Marilyn, as an individual, hadn't really come into any clearer focus than when I started, and I got nearer the reality in Colin Clark's short book, 'My Week with Marilyn'.
This isn't because the book is short on facts! The author has been astonishingly thorough in searching out detailed information on the last months in the star's life. For instance, when Marilyn flew by plane the book includes the flight numbers, tells us where there were stop-overs (if there were any), tells us when the flight touched down (to the minute), and who was there to meet her, sometimes even the cost of the ticket. In extraordinary detail we are frequently told exactly what she wore, who did her hair and when (and emphatically told who didn't do it), we are told the colour of her phones and the length of the phone wires, we are told about her front-door, what sort of nails decorated it (and name of the man who hammered them in), which company supplied a hire-car, how much the ride cost (and sometimes the name of the driver), exactly what Marilyn ordered from wine-merchants and delicatessens and precisely what the bills came to, and even the dates the bills were paid, and if they were paid by cheque....and....etc.
For really devoted fans of Marilyn all this is fascinating information, simply because these facts are a link with Marilyn. However -interesting though all this detail may be- it didn't give me fresh understanding about Marilyn's identity, her nature as a human being, about her inner-self. And that's what REALLY interests me in a biography.
Other aspects of this book are a bit more alarming. Alongside well-researched circumstantial detail, the book also includes a lot of freely-admitted supposition and surmise, "what probably happened". This sort of thing -speculation- makes you feel uneasy. An enormous amount of sensational guesswork about Marilyn's personal life has developed over the years. It has grown across the known facts about her, and almost smothered the reality. I am waiting for a study of Marilyn's life which relates ONLY the confirmed facts about her (and if this leaves baffling gaps in the narrative because known facts are not there, then that's how it should be.) There has been far too much speculative comment about Marilyn and we can't see the wood for the trees. In this book, for example, there is a horrifying description of imagined events at the Cal-Neva Lodge involving Marilyn: this description is highly speculative and doesn't appear to have enough factual evidence to warrant its inclusion.
There are other kinds of mistakes. I'm no Hollywood expert but I know that the Cameraman who photographed Marilyn in "Something's Got to Give" was no less a person than William Daniels, the most respected cinematographer in the business (who photographed nearly all of Garbo's films). When the author refers to "Harry Daniels" as the cameraman, it made me wonder how much he knows about the movie business, and how many other mistakes there might be.
This isn't because the book is short on facts! The author has been astonishingly thorough in searching out detailed information on the last months in the star's life. For instance, when Marilyn flew by plane the book includes the flight numbers, tells us where there were stop-overs (if there were any), tells us when the flight touched down (to the minute), and who was there to meet her, sometimes even the cost of the ticket. In extraordinary detail we are frequently told exactly what she wore, who did her hair and when (and emphatically told who didn't do it), we are told the colour of her phones and the length of the phone wires, we are told about her front-door, what sort of nails decorated it (and name of the man who hammered them in), which company supplied a hire-car, how much the ride cost (and sometimes the name of the driver), exactly what Marilyn ordered from wine-merchants and delicatessens and precisely what the bills came to, and even the dates the bills were paid, and if they were paid by cheque....and....etc.
For really devoted fans of Marilyn all this is fascinating information, simply because these facts are a link with Marilyn. However -interesting though all this detail may be- it didn't give me fresh understanding about Marilyn's identity, her nature as a human being, about her inner-self. And that's what REALLY interests me in a biography.
Other aspects of this book are a bit more alarming. Alongside well-researched circumstantial detail, the book also includes a lot of freely-admitted supposition and surmise, "what probably happened". This sort of thing -speculation- makes you feel uneasy. An enormous amount of sensational guesswork about Marilyn's personal life has developed over the years. It has grown across the known facts about her, and almost smothered the reality. I am waiting for a study of Marilyn's life which relates ONLY the confirmed facts about her (and if this leaves baffling gaps in the narrative because known facts are not there, then that's how it should be.) There has been far too much speculative comment about Marilyn and we can't see the wood for the trees. In this book, for example, there is a horrifying description of imagined events at the Cal-Neva Lodge involving Marilyn: this description is highly speculative and doesn't appear to have enough factual evidence to warrant its inclusion.
There are other kinds of mistakes. I'm no Hollywood expert but I know that the Cameraman who photographed Marilyn in "Something's Got to Give" was no less a person than William Daniels, the most respected cinematographer in the business (who photographed nearly all of Garbo's films). When the author refers to "Harry Daniels" as the cameraman, it made me wonder how much he knows about the movie business, and how many other mistakes there might be.
18 of 20 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
I picked up this book with a certain degree of cynicism having read many of the books previously written on the subject of the death of Marilyn Monroe. I expected this to be little more than a re-hash of all the old conspiracy theories linking Marilyn's death to foul play orchestrated in some way by the Kennedy brothers or by agencies out to protect the Kennedy adminstration. Thankfully Keith Badman has steered away from blindly following in the footsteps of previous authors and instead takes a fresh look at the final few years of Marilyn's life.
The author's research is meticulous and, drawing on documented evidence, quickly dispels some of the myths which have grown up about Marilyn's early childhood, her relationship with the studio executives, and of course with the Kennedy brothers. He examines the circumstances leading up to and following Marilyn's tragic death with a solid foundation of research and documentary evidence.
Overall a well written, well rearched book which is worthy of a place on the bookshelf of anyone with an interest in the life and death of this movie icon.
The author's research is meticulous and, drawing on documented evidence, quickly dispels some of the myths which have grown up about Marilyn's early childhood, her relationship with the studio executives, and of course with the Kennedy brothers. He examines the circumstances leading up to and following Marilyn's tragic death with a solid foundation of research and documentary evidence.
Overall a well written, well rearched book which is worthy of a place on the bookshelf of anyone with an interest in the life and death of this movie icon.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
U*ndocumented rubbish by Dr Bookworm
I had high hopes from this biography - I guess I was suckered in by the words 'The Truth, at last!'. Read more
Published 8 months ago by Dr Bookworm
the final years of marilyn monroe
im a massive marilyn fan, this book covers in detail the last few tears of her life i learned a lot of new info on her life in those years and i thought i was an expert!
Published 9 months ago by dawn s brewis
A very-very interesting book
Although english is not my native language, in fact I have only studied it, I tried hard to read this book carefully and, many times, with the help of a dictionary. Read more
Published 11 months ago by Anna K.
An excellent look at Marilyn's twilight
This book is a surprising interesting and engaging read. The Marilyn we meet here is not the young actress struggling to get a role, but a mature and complex woman whose... Read more
Published 13 months ago by K. Maxwell
Well thought out, not groundbreaking
What I liked about this book: it's not sensationalist, it treats its subject with respect, it has some interesting new photos in it, it considers various possibilities thoroughly... Read more
Published 15 months ago by Karen B
my latest review
Well, the book arrived quickly and I like it, so I can only say that I'm very much satisfied with my purchase. I guess you're not sorry to hear that. Take care. Niels.
Published 16 months ago by Niels B.
THE BEST BOOK EVER WRITTEN ABOUT MARILYN
THIS IS WITHOUT DOUGHT THE BEST BOOK I HAVE EVER READ ABOUT OUR DEAR MARILYN. A HUGE THANK YOU TO THE AUTHOR KEITH BADMAN FOR TAKING THE TIME AND PATIENCE TO WRITE A RELIABLE SOLID... Read more
Published 17 months ago by H. Evans
FINALLY THE HONEST AND TRUE STORY!
Since I first heard of this project I have waited anxiously for it because of the claims made by the author. Read more
Published 19 months ago by fly-rui
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