I spent all afternoon finishing this book.
I hadn't planned to, I hadn't planned on finishing it all. I tried a couple of pages a few weeks back and the style...let's just say the writing did have a style, and it was interior dialogue, somewhat choppy, and this was not the exposé of Frank and Gail Zappa I had expected it to be.
That's what all the press said over the summer. And I'm a big Zappa fan. And you do learn about Frank, but really this book is about Moon and her mother.
Yes, another book about a daughter and her mother. That's what some might think. But I got e-mail from Gail... Out of the blue. And she was the exact person Moon depicts in this book. Running at 100 miles an hour spitting fire and...
If I write about you and you're this angry, go for it. But if I haven't said anything negative about you, even worse, if I've complimented you, this has always flummoxed me. Then again, some people can't help themselves. Interestingly, my worst experiences have been with the wives of legendary musicians...and they haven't been defending their spouses so much as lashing out from their own perspective and...
I grew up always wanting to move to Hollywood, be on television.
Reading this book you'd never want to grow up in Hollywood.
Moon is a seeker. If you grew up in the east, you'll be rolling your eyes, with all the touchy-feely crap, the gurus, the mantras... People do what they need to do to cope, but knowing the progeny of famous entertainers, this is not uncommon, this search for answers.
And so many of these famous musicians didn't go to college themselves, in many cases they were poor students, music was all they could do, not by choice but by gene. So you have Moon getting her GED three years before she was scheduled to graduate from high school.
On one hand she's free of constraint, on another she's under the thumb of her mother.
All Frank does is work and screw. Ahmet told me his father was a swordsman. And it's all documented here. Frank keeps threatening to leave Gail for Gerda in Germany. And there's the groupie from New Zealand who actually lived in their house for a while who contacts Gail when Frank is dying and asks for some sperm so she can have his baby...
You've never experienced the weirdness that famous musicians endure. It's not just fame, it's not movie stars, you see musicians speak through their music, they are that person, and fans want to get closer and will...
Meanwhile, Moon has a crush on Jon Bon Jovi.
Moon is famous. With a hit record and TV appearances but she can't get a date, she's self-conscious over her looks, especially her acne. If you want to get into the mind of an adolescent and then teenage girl/woman...Moon does an excellent job here.
But mostly the family is living in isolation, up on Woodrow Wilson. Everybody knew that was Frank's house, with a studio in the basement, it was legendary.
But the kids might as well have not been living in regular society. It's only when Moon goes to high school that she truly learns how the other half lives. Everybody in the family has dinner at the same time, eating the same thing, and no one can get up until everybody's finished? UNHEARD OF IN THE ZAPPA HOME!
And Gail herself is street smart, but that's about it. She's got all these crazy theories about witches and...
She just doesn't know how to come through. Moon keeps waiting for her to deliver and she doesn't, no matter how many times she is given a chance.
And then there is the money... They tool around in a Rolls, which ultimately doesn't run yet is bequeathed to Ahmet, but cash is always an issue. When Frank gets sick he's got no health insurance and they make Moon sell her house to pay the bills.
So when Moon finally leaves the house she has the adventures the hoi polloi do not. She hangs with famous actors, even dates Woody Harrelson, but when you read the stories you don't feel like you're missing out.
And when a married musician asks her to come visit him on the road, Moon asks her parents and they say to go. You can imagine how that plays out.
And then there's the legal issues. Gail f*cks with Moon and Dweezil from the grave.
And I've heard Ahmet's version of this, but all I'll tell you is you've got to split up your estate equally, leave every child the same amount, or...
A sibling kept on asking my ever more frail mother to carve out money for her challenged child. My mother couldn't believe I wouldn't agree to this. This was after she wanted to split family money seven ways, so I got the same amount as my four nephews, and their mothers.
I told her I could never catch up financially with all the money she'd given to my sisters and their kids, for real estate, education...that I had written off that money, but now she was going to F*CK ME IN THE ASS?
She couldn't understand that this wasn't fair.
And this sibling kept on leaning on my mother, and finally I told my mother that if she didn't split up the money equally, I'd never speak to my sisters again.
And then one day I got a letter from the lawyer saying to sign something. What was this? This same sibling had gone behind my back and made it so all three kids were executors of the estate. Just before he died my father told me he made me the executor because I was the only one who had any business sense.
But when it comes to money...
As a friend of mine once told me, you never really know your family until you share an inheritance.
And I'll tell you I was positively stunned when I read my mother's will and I got a third, after a de minimis payment to my nephews. And I ended up being the executor of the estate anyway...and unlike the fears of an in-law...OF COURSE I WASN'T GOING TO CHARGE TO DO IT!
And there's a great segment in the book about Moon's ill child and...
If you're looking for Zappa gossip, just read a review. If you want to know the travails of the child of a musical icon and his unpredictable, self-centered, tempestuous wife...
THIS BOOK IS THE PLACE!
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