The Empty Glass: A NovelJ.I. Baker
Blue Rider Press, July 2012
ISBN: 978-0399158193
The Empty Glass is an unforgettable combination of the riveting facts and legendary theories that have dogged Monroe, the Kennedy's, the Mafia, and even the CIA for decades. It is an exciting debut from a remarkable new thriller writer.
The Empty Glass by J. I. Baker is a dark noir fiction based on the death of Marilyn Monroe. Ben Fitzgerald is a Deputy Coroner for Los Angeles County on the night that Marilyn Monroe was found dead in her Brentwood home. From the moment Ben entered her bedroom and saw her nude body laying face down, he noticed cracks in the official story that the star had committed suicide.
After finding Monroe’s secret diary, Fitzgerald suspects foul play. As he attempts to make sense of her drug-addled scrawl, both the federal government and the Mafia take an interest in the information he has, which puts his family in jeopardy. The Empty Glass reproduces parts of that diary, giving a fictional first-hand account of Monroe’s drug abuse and depression, and they provide clues to a conspiracy that led to her death.
Baker uses a lot of actual facts from the scene of Monroe’s death to motivate his narrator into investigating a possible cover-up or conspiracy. There were plenty of things that made her death look suspicious: she was found lying flat on her front, holding the phone--a position someone dying of an overdose would not have been able to maintain; the colouration on her body also suggested she had been moved after death; there was bruising on her hip, suggesting either violence or an injection; and of course, there was no water glass. The autopsy reveals no lethal amount of drugs in her system, meaning that she did not digest them--so how did they kill her?
J.I. Baker has done an excellent job of blending facts from the case files and public documents along with myth and the various conspiracy theories that have abounded over the decades since Marilyn was found dead. The Empty Glass is a fast-paced, smart and noirish novel narrated by the deputy coroner who becomes entrapped in a web of deceit involving doctors, the White House and the Mafia.
J. I. BAKER is the executive editor of Conde Nast Traveler, and a former development editor at Time Inc. He has also worked at Real Simple, Glamour, and US Weekly and is a founding editor of Time Out New York. The Empty Glass is his first novel. For more information visit emptyglassnovel.com.
ISBN: 978-0399158193; ISBN10: 0399158197; Imprint: Blue Rider Press; On Sale: 7/19/2012; Format: Hardcover; Pages: 336; $25.95
