The Last Days of Marilyn Monroe
A True Crime Thriller
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4.0 • 64 Ratings
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- $15.99
Publisher Description
From the world’s #1 bestselling author, The Last Days of Marilyn Monroe is a true crime thriller about a woman who changed Hollywood history, and whose indelible image captures our imagination to this day.
“Electrifying … A spellbinding new account of the star’s final days by the world’s greatest thriller writer." —Daily Mail
In life, Marilyn Monroe’s superstardom defies classification. In death, she remains shrouded in mystery.
In the months before her death, Marilyn polishes the script for her ultimately unfinished film, Something’s Got to Give.
In the weeks before her death, she drinks champagne on Santa Monica Beach with the last photographer to take her picture.
In the days before her death, she’s a guest of Frank Sinatra in the Celebrity Room at the Cal Neva Lodge.
In the hours before her death, she argues with US Attorney General Bobby Kennedy and his brother-in-law Peter Lawford.
In an emergency session with her psychiatrist, she confesses: “Here I am, the most beautiful woman in the world, and I do not have a date for Saturday night.”
On June 1, 2026, the world celebrates Marilyn Monroe’s one hundredth birthday … without her.
“Entertaining … bursting with anecdotes … zippy pacing and novelistic detail … Readers with a soft spot for Hollywood’s perennial muse will find plenty to enjoy.”— Publishers Weekly
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Patterson (The Idaho Four) teams up with journalist Edwards-Jones (The Witches of St. Petersburg) for an entertaining, lightly fictionalized account of Marilyn Monroe's life and death. Writing from an omniscient, third-person-present perspective, the authors run through the highlights and lowlights of Norma Jeane Mortenson's tumultuous 1930s California childhood, dissect her famous affairs and brushes with organized crime, and speculate about the possible causes—including suicide, murder, or overdose—of her untimely death in 1962. Heavy on dialogue and bursting with anecdotes about the men who tried to define Monroe's legacy, including ex-husbands Arthur Miller and Joe DiMaggio and political figures from JFK to Nikita Khrushchev, the narrative makes up for its familiarity with zippy pacing and novelistic detail. (When DiMaggio briefly disappears from her life after Christmas 1961, Monroe keeps her tree up: "The pine needles have long since dropped, the lights are broken, and the ornaments are hanging limply from the bent branches.") Though the authors don't offer much new or revelatory information about Monroe, there's enough craft on display to keep the pages turning. Readers with a soft spot for Hollywood's perennial muse will find plenty to enjoy.
