Blonde
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Narrated by:
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Jayne Atkinson
About this listen
In her most ambitious work to date, Joyce Carol Oates, one of America's most distinguished writers, reimagines the inner, poetic, and spiritual life of Norma Jeane Baker, the child, the woman, the fated celebrity, and tells the story in Norma Jeane's own voice: startling, rich, and shattering.
Drawing on biographical and historical sources, Joyce Carol Oates evokes the distinct consciousness of the woman and the unsparing reflection of the myth, writing as she has never written before, ecstatic, completely absorbed, inhabited as if by the spirit of her extraordinary subject. Rich with psychological insight and disturbing irony, this mesmerizing narrative illumines Norma Jeane's lonely childhood, wrenching adolescence, and the creation of Marilyn Monroe.
With fresh insights into the heart of a celebrity culture hypnotized by its own myths, Blonde is a sweeping novel about the elusive magic of a woman, the lasting legacy of a star, and the heartbreak behind the creation of the most evocative icon of the 20th century.
©2001 Joyce Carol Oates (P)2001 HarperCollins Publishers, Inc.Listeners also enjoyed...
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Performance
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
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A strong story
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
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Critic reviews
"Atkinson narrates Oates's fictional biography of Marilyn Monroe in an intense, slightly husky voice that immediately grabs and holds the listener's attention." (Publishers Weekly)
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Tender Is the Night
- By: F. Scott Fitzgerald
- Narrated by: Therese Plummer
- Length: 12 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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Set on the French Riviera in the late 1920s, Tender Is the Night is the tragic romance of the young actress Rosemary Hoyt and the stylish American couple Dick and Nicole Diver. A brilliant young psychiatrist at the time of his marriage, Dick is both husband and doctor to Nicole, whose wealth goads him into a lifestyle not his own, and whose growing strength highlights Dick's harrowing demise. A profound study of the romantic concept of character - lyrical, expansive, and hauntingly evocative.
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Subtle yet grand
- By jb on 10-12-15
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Final Cuts
- New Tales of Hollywood Horror and Other Spectacles
- By: Ellen Datlow
- Narrated by: Khristine Hvam
- Length: 15 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
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From the secret reels of a notoriously cursed cinematic masterpiece to the debauched livestreams of modern movie junkies who will do anything for clicks, Final Cuts brings together new and terrifying stories inspired by the many screens we can't peel our eyes away from. Inspired by the rich golden age of the film and television industries as well as the new media present, this new anthology reveals what evils hide behind the scenes and between the frames of our favorite medium.
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Not Poor, Not Rich
- By Gary & Jay on 08-23-20
By: Ellen Datlow
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Fault Lines
- A Novel
- By: Emily Itami
- Narrated by: Lydia Wilson
- Length: 5 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
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Mizuki is a Japanese housewife. She has a hardworking husband, two adorable children, and a beautiful Tokyo apartment. It’s everything a woman could want, yet sometimes she wonders whether she would rather throw herself off the high-rise balcony than spend another evening not talking to her husband and hanging up laundry.
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Confused by the choice of narrator
- By Bri T. on 02-13-22
By: Emily Itami
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My Life as a Rat
- A Novel
- By: Joyce Carol Oates
- Narrated by: Sadie Alexandru
- Length: 13 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
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My Life as a Rat follows Violet Rue Kerrigan, a young woman who looks back upon her life in exile from her family following her testimony, at age 12, concerning what she knew to be the racist murder of an African American boy by her older brothers. In a succession of vividly recalled episodes, Violet contemplates the circumstances of her life as the initially beloved youngest child of seven Kerrigan children who inadvertently “informs” on her brothers, setting into motion their arrests and convictions and her own long estrangement.
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Heavy Topics & Satisfying Story
- By Oscar on 06-30-19
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Myra Breckinridge
- A Novel (Myra and Myron, Book 1)
- By: Gore Vidal, Camille Paglia - introduction
- Narrated by: Michelle Hendley, Camille Paglia
- Length: 6 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
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"I am Myra Breckinridge, whom no man will ever possess." So begins the irresistible testimony of the luscious instructor of Empathy and Posture at Buck Loner's Academy of Drama and Modeling. Myra has a secret that only her surgeon shares; a passion for classic Hollywood films, which she regards as the supreme achievements of Western culture; and a sacred mission to bring heteronormative civilization to its knees. Fifty years after its first publication unleashed gales of laughter, delight, and ferocious dissent, Myra's moment to instruct and delight has once again arrived.
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Well performed
- By Kenny D on 06-08-19
By: Gore Vidal, and others
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The Godmothers
- A Novel
- By: Camille Aubray
- Narrated by: Lisa Flanagan, Saskia Maarleveld
- Length: 13 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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Meet the Godmothers: Filomena is a clever and resourceful war refugee with a childhood secret, who comes to America to wed Mario, the family's favored son. Amie, a beautiful and dreamy French girl from upstate New York, escapes an abusive husband after falling in love with Johnny, the oldest of the brothers. Lucy, a tough-as-nails Irish nurse, ran away from a strict girls' home and marries Frankie, the sensuous middle son. And the glamorous Petrina, the family's only daughter, graduates with honors from Barnard College despite a past trauma that nearly caused a family scandal.
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Easy Enjoyable Read
- By Bunny on 06-23-21
By: Camille Aubray
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The Golden Hour
- A Novel
- By: Beatriz Williams
- Narrated by: Cassandra Campbell, Saskia Maarleveld
- Length: 16 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
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The Bahamas, 1941. Newly widowed Leonora “Lulu” Randolph arrives in Nassau to investigate the governor and his wife for a New York society magazine. After all, American readers have an insatiable appetite for news of the duke and duchess of Windsor, that glamorous couple whose love affair nearly brought the British monarchy to its knees five years earlier. What more intriguing backdrop for their romance than a wartime Caribbean paradise, a colonial playground for kingpins of ill-gotten empires? Or so Lulu imagines.
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Stick with it!
- By Colleen on 07-17-19
By: Beatriz Williams
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My Body
- By: Emily Ratajkowski
- Narrated by: Emily Ratajkowski
- Length: 5 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
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Emily Ratajkowski is an acclaimed model and actress, an engaged political progressive, a formidable entrepreneur, a global social media phenomenon, and now, a writer. Rocketing to world fame at age 21, Ratajkowski sparked both praise and furor with the provocative display of her body as an unapologetic statement of feminist empowerment. The subsequent evolution in her thinking about our culture’s commodification of women is the subject of this book.
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so vain..
- By Emily Valdez on 01-10-22
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Fury
- By: Salman Rushdie
- Narrated by: Salman Rushdie
- Length: 9 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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The world renowned author of The Satanic Verses and The Ground Beneath Her Feet, Salman Rushdie is a Whitbread Award winner and recipient of the Booker Prize. His first truly American novel, Fury is a metaphorically rich black comedy that reflects the pressure-cooker of modern life. Malik Solanka, irascible doll-maker and retired historian of ideas, suffers the pain of wanting without knowing exactly what it is he wants.
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surprisingly good
- By David on 11-21-07
By: Salman Rushdie
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Impossible
- By: Nancy Werlin
- Narrated by: Emily Durante
- Length: 8 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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Lucy Scarborough is 17 when she discovers that the women of her family have been cursed through the generations, forced to attempt three seemingly impossible tasks or to fall into madness upon their child's birth. How can Lucy succeed when all of her ancestors have tried and failed? But Lucy is the first girl who won't be alone as she tackles the list. She has her fiercely protective foster parents beside her. And she has Zach, whose strength amazes her more each day. Do they have enough love and resolve to overcome an age-old evil?
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Amazing!!
- By S. McGowan on 04-03-11
By: Nancy Werlin
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Pale Horse, Pale Rider
- Three Short Novels
- By: Katherine Anne Porter
- Narrated by: Chelsea Stephens
- Length: 6 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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The classic 1939 collection of three novellas by the Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award-winning author and journalist, including the famous title story set during the influenza epidemic of 1918.
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Some of the most brilliant prose ever written
- By Anonymous User on 03-21-23
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Overlooked Masterpiece
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While Drowning...
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Bellefleur
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A wealthy and notorious clan, the Bellefleurs live in a region not unlike the Adirondacks, in an enormous mansion on the shores of mythic Lake Noir. They own vast lands and profitable businesses, they employ their neighbors, and they influence the government. A prolific and eccentric group, they include several millionaires, a mass murderer, a spiritual seeker who climbs into the mountains looking for God, a wealthy noctambulist who dies of a chicken scratch.
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Old School Gothic Literature (Not a beach read)
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Butcher
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In this harrowing story based on authentic historical documents, we follow the career of Dr. Silas Weir, “Father of Gyno-Psychiatry,” as he ascends from professional anonymity to national renown. Humiliated by a procedure gone terribly wrong, Weir is forced to take a position at the New Jersey Asylum for Female Lunatics, where he reigns. There, he is allowed to continue his practice, unchecked for decades, making a name for himself by focusing on women who have been neglected by the state—women he subjects to the most grotesque modes of experimentation.
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JCO is a treasure
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The Doll-Master
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In the title story, a young boy becomes obsessed with his cousin's doll after she tragically passes away from leukemia. As he grows older, he begins to collect "found dolls" from the surrounding neighborhoods and stores his treasures in the abandoned carriage house on his family's estate. But just what kind of dolls are they?In The Doll-Master and Other Tales of Terror, Joyce Carol Oates evokes the “fascination of the abomination” that is at the core of the most profound, the most unsettling, and the most memorable of dark mystery fiction.
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Boring
- By Kelly on 10-17-19
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Breathe
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- Length: 10 hrs and 45 mins
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Amid a starkly beautiful but uncanny landscape in New Mexico, a married couple from Cambridge, MA, takes residency at a distinguished academic institute. When the husband is stricken with a mysterious illness, misdiagnosed at first, their lives are uprooted and husband and wife each embarks upon a nightmare journey. At 37, Michaela faces the terrifying prospect of widowhood - and the loss of Gerard, whose identity has greatly shaped her own.
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Disappointing story from a fave writer
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We Were the Mulvaneys
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Judd is the youngest of the four Mulvaney children - three boys and a girl - on their parents’ lush farm in upstate New York. In his childhood, Judd is swept along by the sheer energy of the Mulvaneys and their wealth of beloved family stories. But now, 30 years old, Judd looks back through his memories to tell the secrets that eventually ripped apart the fabric of his storybook family.
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Overlooked Masterpiece
- By Jason on 10-26-12
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Black Water
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On Grayling Island, off the coast of Maine, Kelly Kelleher meets the Senator at a Fourth of July beach party. He is old enough to be her father; she is young enough to find his attention flattering. And with an optimism born of inexperience, she believes she can take care of herself. As evening approaches, the two move unaware toward a shattering appointment with destiny. When the Senator offers Kelly a ride to the ferry, it is not love but death that awaits her.
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While Drowning...
- By Mel on 07-09-17
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Bellefleur
- Gothic Saga Series, Book 1
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A wealthy and notorious clan, the Bellefleurs live in a region not unlike the Adirondacks, in an enormous mansion on the shores of mythic Lake Noir. They own vast lands and profitable businesses, they employ their neighbors, and they influence the government. A prolific and eccentric group, they include several millionaires, a mass murderer, a spiritual seeker who climbs into the mountains looking for God, a wealthy noctambulist who dies of a chicken scratch.
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Old School Gothic Literature (Not a beach read)
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Butcher
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In this harrowing story based on authentic historical documents, we follow the career of Dr. Silas Weir, “Father of Gyno-Psychiatry,” as he ascends from professional anonymity to national renown. Humiliated by a procedure gone terribly wrong, Weir is forced to take a position at the New Jersey Asylum for Female Lunatics, where he reigns. There, he is allowed to continue his practice, unchecked for decades, making a name for himself by focusing on women who have been neglected by the state—women he subjects to the most grotesque modes of experimentation.
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JCO is a treasure
- By wooden indian on 10-16-24
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The Doll-Master
- And Other Tales of Terror
- By: Joyce Carol Oates
- Narrated by: Robert Fass, Kirsten Potter
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Performance
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Story
In the title story, a young boy becomes obsessed with his cousin's doll after she tragically passes away from leukemia. As he grows older, he begins to collect "found dolls" from the surrounding neighborhoods and stores his treasures in the abandoned carriage house on his family's estate. But just what kind of dolls are they?In The Doll-Master and Other Tales of Terror, Joyce Carol Oates evokes the “fascination of the abomination” that is at the core of the most profound, the most unsettling, and the most memorable of dark mystery fiction.
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Boring
- By Kelly on 10-17-19
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Breathe
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Amid a starkly beautiful but uncanny landscape in New Mexico, a married couple from Cambridge, MA, takes residency at a distinguished academic institute. When the husband is stricken with a mysterious illness, misdiagnosed at first, their lives are uprooted and husband and wife each embarks upon a nightmare journey. At 37, Michaela faces the terrifying prospect of widowhood - and the loss of Gerard, whose identity has greatly shaped her own.
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Disappointing story from a fave writer
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The Joyce Carol Oates Collection
- By: Joyce Carol Oates
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Eight highly diverse works from one of America’s most prolific and versatile authors. This collection includes an exclusive dramatization of Oates’ best-selling novel American Appetites; two comedic plays, The Perfectionist and The Truth Teller; four short plays (Gulf War, Black, The Key, and Tone Clusters); as well as her libretto for Black Water: An American Opera, composed by John Duffy.
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Classic Oates
- By Dian on 04-16-18
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Babysitter
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In the waning days of the turbulent 1970s, in the wake of unsolved child-killings that have shocked Detroit, the lives of several residents are drawn together with tragic consequences. There is Hannah, wife of a prominent local businessman, who has begun an affair with a darkly charismatic stranger whose identity remains elusive; Mikey, a canny street hustler who finds himself on a chilling mission to rectify injustice; and the serial killer known as Babysitter, an enigmatic and terrifying figure at the periphery of elite Detroit.
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Insidious Evil
- By Edward Martinez on 09-09-22
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Cardiff, by the Sea
- Four Novellas of Suspense
- By: Joyce Carol Oates
- Narrated by: Lauren Ezzo
- Length: 11 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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In these psychologically daring, chillingly suspenseful pieces, the author of We Were the Mulvaneys and Blonde writes about women facing threats past and present, once again cementing her reputation for "great intelligence and dead-on imaginative powers" (Los Angeles Times Book Review).
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All stories in collection
- By Betsy Ross on 12-10-22
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A Widow's Story
- A Memoir
- By: Joyce Carol Oates
- Narrated by: Ellen Parker
- Length: 14 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
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In a work unlike anything she's written before, National Book Award-winner Joyce Carol Oates unveils a poignant, intimate memoir about the unexpected death of her husband of 46 years and its wrenching, surprising aftermath.
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Breathless!
- By Pamela Harvey on 02-18-11
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The Corn Maiden and Other Nightmares
- Novellas and Stories of Unspeakable Dread
- By: Joyce Carol Oates
- Narrated by: Adam Verner, Christine Williams
- Length: 10 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
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An incomparable master storyteller in all forms, in The Corn Maiden and Other Nightmares Joyce Carol Oates spins six imaginative tales of suspense. The Corn Maiden is the gut-wrenching story of Marissa, a beautiful and sweet, but somewhat slow, eleven-year-old girl with hair the color of corn silk. Her single mother comes home one night to find her missing and panics, frantically knocking on the doors of her neighbors.
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Very Unsettling
- By Michael on 07-03-12
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My Story
- By: Marilyn Monroe
- Narrated by: January LaVoy
- Length: 4 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
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Marilyn Monroe had the most famous face of the 20th century. A legendary actress, comedienne, and sex symbol, she has been one of Hollywood’s most talked-about performers ever since she first crossed the silver screen. Her fame persisted long after her tragic death—but as time has gone by, it has become almost impossible to separate the legend of the woman born as Norma Jeane from the truth. Now, at last, Marilyn’s real story can be told.
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Nice To Hear Norma Jean
- By Brooke R. Calder on 02-23-23
By: Marilyn Monroe
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Evil Eye
- Four Novellas of Love Gone Wrong
- By: Joyce Carol Oates
- Narrated by: Donna Postel, Luci Christian, Chris Patton, and others
- Length: 6 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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Listeners know that few authors are able to create an atmosphere of unease and terror as well as Oates, a fact confirmed by the four novellas presented here. All the novellas in this collection revolve around the theme of love gone wrong - horribly, shockingly wrong.
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Some of the stories are excellent!
- By Matthew S. Hill on 03-29-17
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48 Clues into the Disappearance of My Sister
- By: Joyce Carol Oates
- Narrated by: Sarah Welborn
- Length: 6 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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Marguerite, a beautiful woman, has disappeared from her small town in Upstate New York. But is foul play involved? Or did she merely take an opportunity to get away for fun, or finally make the decision to leave behind her claustrophobic life of limited opportunities? Her younger sister Gigi wonders if the flimsy silk Dior dress, so casually abandoned on the floor, is a clue to Marguerite's having seemingly vanished. The police examine the footprints made by her Ferragamo boots leaving the house, ending abruptly, and puzzle over how that can help lead to her.
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Clever and horrifying
- By Joan Sutton on 03-19-23
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Because It Is Bitter, and Because It Is My Heart
- By: Joyce Carol Oates
- Narrated by: Constance Towers
- Length: 3 hrs
- Abridged
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Lonely Iris Courtney learns about life in the small town of Hammond, New York, where blacks and whites live separate lives. She learns of love from her parents—hard-drinking, hard-living Duke Courtney and his stormy marriage with the lovely but troubled Persia Courtney. But Iris learns most from Verlyn "Jinx" Fairchild, star of the basketball courts, his hopes for a way out of Hammond pinned to a college scholarship.
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Beautiful Days
- Stories
- By: Joyce Carol Oates
- Narrated by: Tavia Gilbert, Stephen Graybill, Caitlin Kelly
- Length: 13 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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A collection of 13 mesmerizing stories by American master Joyce Carol Oates, including the 2017 Pushcart Prize-winning "Undocumented Alien". The diverse stories of Beautiful Days explore the most secret, intimate, and unacknowledged interior lives of characters not unlike ourselves, who assert their independence in acts of bold and often irrevocable defiance.
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Poor editing
- By Needles on 11-18-18
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A Book of American Martyrs
- A Novel
- By: Joyce Carol Oates
- Narrated by: Neil Hellegers, Tavia Gilbert, Kirsten Potter
- Length: 24 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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In this striking, enormously affecting novel, Joyce Carol Oates tells the story of two very different yet intimately linked American families. Luther Dunphy is an ardent Evangelical who envisions himself as acting out God's will when he assassinates an abortion provider in his small Ohio town while Augustus Voorhees, the idealistic doctor who is killed, leaves behind a wife and children scarred and embittered by grief.
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NO! Just NO! INSULTING!
- By Jill Reynolds on 06-01-17
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We Were the Mulvaneys
- By: Joyce Carol Oates
- Narrated by: J. Todd Adams
- Length: 6 hrs and 56 mins
- Abridged
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The Mulvaneys are blessed by all that makes life sweet: a hardworking father, a loving mother, three fine sons, and a bright, pretty daughter. But an incident occurs on Valentine's Day, 1976 - hushed up in the rural town of Mt. Ephraim, New York and never spoken of in the Mulvaney home - that rends the fabric of their family life.
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Doesn't ring true
- By Moire on 09-12-03
What listeners say about Blonde
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- James Hill
- 04-04-22
FARCICLE STORY
Talk about rewriting history. Joyce Carol Oates obviously just pumped this story out to make a few bucks and meanwhile added to the misconceptions regarding Marilyn Monroe. Not well written, but well performed. Written like the author walked away from the manuscript for weeks at a time and didn't look at where she left off.
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- TS
- 09-11-22
A Literary Triumph
Powerful. First the writing was exceptional. Second, the narration was phenomenal and lit this work on fire! Fabulous as an audio book.
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- cocopuff
- 09-27-12
Couldn't stop listening
Rarely write a review, but the melding of prose and reader was so perfect. I don't care about the historical accuracy ... it was psychologically convincing and mesmerizing.
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6 people found this helpful
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Overall
- Hal
- 04-30-08
When it's good it couldn't be better
When its bad its only mediocre.
The recreation of her first date with Arthur Miller, for example, is a high point. Her attempts to create great literature don't always work, for example, the opening scene with the messenger boy delivering death.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Kyle
- 03-18-17
5 stars
The narrator's smoky, Peggy Lee voice pairs perfectly with JCO's emotional, sinister, always real take on Marilyn's life. A must read.
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4 people found this helpful
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- Elise Bush
- 08-25-22
Abridged? Disappointingly short
When I purchased “Blonde,” nowhere did it reveal that this is an abridged edition. But I simultaneously bought the ebook. Sometimes I like to read and sometimes listen.
So I couldn’t figure out why my progress in reading was much different than my listening until seeing some reviews. Thanks for cheating us, Audible, with a partial book for full price. The narrator’s performance is excellent, but I’d like the whole book please.
The interview at the end with Joyce Carol Oates is excellent.
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- Kindle Customer
- 10-07-22
Much more than a sex simple
I mean that. Not just a “sex simple”
Joyce Carol Oates wrote her character into flesh and soul the way an actor, much like Norma Jean as her character, becomes the character. Highly moving to me as an artist. Thank you for the interview at the end too. This exploration of the art forms In the book and possible with Michael well augmented the experience of the book. I look forward to watching the screen representation. Thank you Joyce 😌
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Overall
- S. Munnell
- 11-04-05
Conflicted points of view
While lending credibility to the possibility that Marilyn Monroe was misused and misunderstood, reports of her talent are over stated by the author. The voice of the narrator tells us of her lovers, while secondary reports tell us of her depravity. If you accept only the narrator's perspective, then you will be sympathetic to Marilyn's plight. If you believe the narrator's voice telling you how brilliantly she did in "Misfits," then you'll wonder why her name isn't mentioned today with the same reverence as, say, Katherine Hepburn.
What you do gain is insight into the early Hollywood heydays where the studio controlled all and starlets were merely chattel. If this interests you, you will enjoy "Blonde." As a fictionalized biography, Blonde covers most aspects of Marilyn's life yet she still comes off as vacuous in the book as she did in the movies. As with any novel, the key is in having a charater you care about. It's hard to care for Marilyn. I even listened to the interview with the author regarding her character development, but while I could see Oates' craft in the novel, "Blonde" was only fair.
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5 people found this helpful
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- Maya A.
- 07-07-16
Amazing writing and narration, what a treat!
I've never read a real biography written this way before. Blew me away, so fun. Loved the narrator making the story come to life In a whole new way with her changes in tones and voices.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Rsw
- 10-13-22
Exceptional
loved it! hung on every word. the prose like writing appeals to your emotions and connection. Oates has out done it with Blonde!
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