Marilyn
By Andre de Dienes

Before Marilyn Monroe had her blonde hair, her film career, her bouts of depression, her affairs with the Kennedy men, and her famous failed marriages, she was Norma Jeane Baker, a breathtaking, stunning ingénue from sunny southern California.

While her first husband was stationed in the south Pacific during WWII, Norma Jeane met a photographer named André de Dienes, who became smitten by this brunette beauty. Together, they traveled throughout the western states in his Buick Roadmaster, taking hundreds of pictures on the beach, in the snow, and in the mountains.

Now, 40 years after her tragic death, TASCHEN has published an amazing collection of de Dienes' images that takes readers time traveling through the life of norma Jeane before and after she became the quintessential blonde bombshell.

If the images don't capture your attention, the presentation of the photographs will. The publishers have placed the impeccably printed book within a 16'x19' Kodak professional film box: bright yellow, weathered, and labeled with grease pencil as id unearthed from the archives of this photographer's studio. The commemorative box (which retails for $200) also contains a small binder of de Dienes' magazine covers featuring Norma Jeane, and an exact replica of de Dienes' diary with day-to-day reflections about their lifelong friendship through her transformation into "Marilyn Monroe" the icon.

Although you can easily spend hours looking at the joyful, youthful images in this book, you will inevitable catch yourself searching Marilyn's face to spot the sadness of a tragic life. And when you find it, you miss her even more.

—Jeffrey R. Griffith

Order yours—click here.