They were an unlikely pair—a blond bombshell and a photographer determined to be taken seriously—but Marilyn Monroe and Eve Arnold would make a deal that would change their lives in this dazzling new novel from the national bestselling author of Mrs. Poe and The Woman with the Cure.

In 1952, Norma Jeane Baker follows documentary photographer Eve Arnold into a powder room on the night they first meet. She has a proposition for her. Norma Jeane created Marilyn Monroe to be photographed, and she wants Eve to do it. Eve is better than anyone she’s seen at capturing a person’s inner truth. Together they can help each other. Together, she says, they can make something brilliant.

Skeptical of this cipher of a young woman, Eve demurs. She’s looking for more serious subjects than this ambitious starlet. But she keeps getting drawn back into Marilyn’s orbit, and the women come to recognize something in each other—something fundamental. Nothing will get in the way of what they want, and when Marilyn’s star takes off to teetering heights, neither will ever be the same.

A lavish and transporting novel, When We Were Brilliant captures the halcyon days of an icon and the grit of women determining their own futures as it explores the exceptional and complicated friendship between Marilyn Monroe and Eve Arnold.

Review:

Fascinating, captivating, and rich!

When We Were Brilliant is an insightful, immersive novel set in the 1950s that draws readers into the lives of photographer Eve Arnold and her most famous subject and close friend Marilyn Monroe, through their unusual, evolving bond, the highs and lows of fame and fortune, the pressures of marriage, the ache of loss, and the toll of living under constant public scrutiny.

Overall, When We Were Brilliant is a vivid, absorbing novel by Cullen that showcases her impressive research and deep understanding of both a pioneering photographer and a brilliant, misunderstood actress whose life was tragically short and painfully complicated, yet who is unfortunately too often remembered only for her beauty and sex appeal.

This book is available now.

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