…I finish Earth to Moon, the memoir by Moon Unit Zappa. Minutes after finishing, I will attempt to sum up, to share the experience in miniature. First, I must confess it took me a flipping long time to finish. I think I started reading this fall, maybe in September or as late as October, and then, for some reason, having nothing to do with my feelings about the experience, I put it down. And it sat on my desk for a couple of months, just languishing. I have spoken about this in previous posts–the paralysis of my reading muscle, and my hopes to fight against it in 2025 moving forward. I know that I must read more–and I feel this almost as if my life depended upon it. I’ve recently purchased a couple of new titles that I hope will be my first reads, cover to cover, of the new year. I’ve got James by Percival Everett, and There There by Tommy Orange just waiting on my side table, but I thought the first reading task of 2025 should be to finish what I started, so today I finished Moon Unit Zappa’s memoir.
Before I move on, a side note. My wife René has been working at her computer and milling around the house and making cookies wearing her apple ear buds, and she’s been singing, really loud, and it’s fun to hear her sing when she is somewhat unaware that someone might be listening to her. But I suspect that she’s been listening to the same album or playlist on a loop, because I just heard her singing to a song that I swear she was singing to about twenty minutes or a half an hour ago. I sometimes think that my partner does not listen to enough new music, but every once in a while she gets on a kick and she will repeat, over and over again, a particular thing. Tonight, I think, it’s the playlist that goes along with the 2025 Rex Putnam Indoor Percussion show, “The Wave,” which features music by Patrick Watson, Beck, and a female singer’s cover version of “In the Air Tonight” by Phil Collins. She will not likely read this, so this little joke is between you and me right now, as she sings away in the kitchen, making cookies that ultimately fail, because she put the wrong ingredients together. She must be tired. Her cookies never fail.
It’s hard to sum up this memoir by Moon Unit Zappa. I have been a long time fan of her father. I came to Frank Zappa’s music late, when I was a teenager and the bulk of his studio album output was behind him, but I listened adoringly to those early and late 80’s albums, and I made the journey back all the way to the 60’s to listen and learn from his back catalog. I think I have more Zappa titles in my CD collection than any other artist. I have almost everything. I was pretty hard core. I admired his musical prowess and genius, his unconventionality, his humor, his prurient lyrics, his politics, his cool. Most of his music withstands the test of time for me, even though my 21st century sensibilities might cringe a bit at some of the subject matter of his late 70s output. Nevertheless, I’m still a fan.
But I think this memoir made me a bigger fan of Moon Unit. Anyone reading this memoir hoping to simply read about Frank will be disappointed. I mean, he figures in it significantly (how could he not?), but this book is not about him, it’s about Moon. But it sheds light on Frank, not as an artist, but as a dad, that is far from flattering. One of the paradoxes of this book, and of Moon’s experience, is that Frank Zappa and her mother Gail were both pretty much shit parents, but her love for them, and forgiveness of their shortcomings, is abiding and inspiring.
The memoir’s most salient aspects: it’s highly entertaining, both super funny in places and intensely moving in others. Moon’s voice rings true and clear throughout. The writing is lively and conversational, irreverent, and captures an authentic sense of Moon’s unique and gifted voice. It’s written almost entirely in present tense and records (amazingly) Moon in the moment of each event–which is wild–because she presents herself in these scenes in the way she was (or the way she recollects she was) in each moment without the benefit of interpretation or analysis–so as a young stupid person she portrays herself as such, not because she tells us she was, but because we can see it. It’s refreshing and humanizing and demonstrates an incredible humility and honesty. Her story is pretty remarkable, but also (notwithstanding her privilege of hobnobbing with famous people on the regular) not unlike what it was like for most of us growing up in the 80’s. The most powerful moments in the memoir surround her father’s death, her daughter’s severe illness, her mother’s death, and the aftermath estrangement from her siblings. That whole last 50 pages or more is pretty heartbreaking, but also remarkable, as she seems to be able to transcend most of that garbage through a deep grieving process, an intense love for her daughter and for living, and a philosophy and world view that far surpasses in sophistication and wisdom, it seems, what her famous parents were even remotely capable of. I kind of fell in love with her, to tell the truth. I’d recommend this memoir, even if you aren’t a Zappa fan, for its humanity, its wit, and its wisdom. Super strong stuff, Moon. Thank you!
michael jarmer 