But what Summers deals out to Sinatra is nothing compared to his treatment of the Kennedys. On the basis of his witnesses, Summers draws a disparaging picture of Joe DiMaggio and Frank Sinatra. Many make statements about Monroe and her lovers that are absurd to those who knew her. Many of Summers’ witnesses are sleazy characters-hookers and hustlers and private detectives. “Goddess” reeks with the sort of gossip that some will find delicious and others nasty. On his evidence, Monroe must have been the most compulsive nymphomaniac since Messalina. Summers is less interested in Monroe the complicated human being than he is in the myth. And he has discovered and published a photograph of Monroe after the autopsy, a photograph that is the ultimate horror. He has made Monroe’s private life public, recounting alleged amours with the famous and the infamous, and the final maelstrom of alcohol and sleeping pills. A biographer with an investigative reporter’s sensibility and infinite patience, Summers has tracked down more than 600 witnesses and delved into government files and other untapped sources. Twenty-three years after her death, she is impersonated by Theresa Russell in “Insignificance,” imitated by Madonna in the “Material Girl” video, reincarnated as Miranda Richardson in “Dance With a Stranger,” and now cruelly dissected by Anthony Summers in “Goddess.” This is the best of Monroe books, it is the worst of Monroe books. Like a restless spirit, Marilyn Monroe keeps returning. GODDESS: THE SECRET LIVES OF MARILYN MONROE by Anthony Summers.
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