Preface by Co de Kloet:

Bob Zappa’s first book, FRANKIE & BOBBY: Growing Up Zappa, was a great read and a beautiful “painting” of an era I never experience. His second book is just as enjoyable.

Frank was, as everybody with good taste and insight knows, a phenomenon impossible to describe. Many writers and filmmakers tried to grasp his uniqueness and, while many did nice jobs, not all got it right.

Many forgot to mention that Frank often referred to himself as “a regular guy.” And that is the force of this book. By sharing personal, sometimes extremely personal stories about his relationship with Frank, Bob gives us a clear view of that ‘regular-guyness’ quality, leaving the importance and impact of his brother intact.

By not just focusing on Frank and giving us information about other relations and some of his own experiences, he puts Frank in a new and sincere perspective. I had a great time reading it and I hope it will do well.

Over the years I had a friendship with Herbie Cohen, Frank’s manager and business partner. He was at my farmhouse a few times and once when he was reading something in a book about Zappa, he smiled and said, ‘It is always fun to read what people THINK really happened (in Frank’s life) but they haven’t got a clue.”

Bob Zappa has! And that is what makes this book a must have. Thanks Bob, and thanks as always, Frank.

Co de Kloet is a well-known radio personality and music producer in Amsterdam. He had a long personal relationship with Frank starting in 1977 until Frank’s death in 1993. 

Review by Dr. Joe Klein, professor and chairman of the Composition Studies Department at the University of North Texas College of Music who teaches a course on Frank's life and music:

Who’d have thought when Frank and Bobby Zappa parted ways at the end of Bob Zappa’s first book, Frankie and Bobby: Growing Up Zappa, that there would be so much more of their story to tell?

With this equally engaging sequel, Frankie and Bobby: The Rest of the Story, Bob Zappa fills even more gaps in his brother’s biography, with touching vignettes of how their lives intermittently intersected over the last decades of Frank’s life.

As with his first book, The Rest of the Story paints an evocative portrait of life in America through personal anecdotes of the author, this time beginning with the Vietnam era through the present day.

Along the way, Frank makes a number of appearances, as critical points in the iconic musician’s life and career are set into relief from the perspective of his brother Bob’s own path – the latter of which resonates more with us “regular folks,” for whom Frank’s extraordinary life in the public eye would seem to be such a foreign experience.

Perhaps most poignant are the episodes relating to Frank’s own family – in particular his wife, Gail, and her increasingly irrational behavior during the final years of Frank’s life.

If for no other reason, Bob’s unflinching account of that strange relationship is significant in shedding a stark light on a matter that has baffled and frustrated the Zappa fan community for decades.

Bob and his family’s banishment from Frank’s and the Zappa kids’ lives is a bizarre and heartbreaking tale; the silver lining to it all is the moving reunion of Moon and Dweezil with their uncle and his family following Gail’s death, after more than four decades of imposed estrangement.

Frankie and Bobby: The Rest of the Story is another must-read for any Zappologist curious for answers regarding some of the more enigmatic aspects of Frank’s life.

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