SHRAPNEL IN THE SAN FERNANDO VALLEY

A Los Angeles artist revisits her
volatile life as a Scientologist rocker in this debut memoir.

Es grew up moving around the San
Fernando Valley, switching neighborhoods on the whims of her unstable mother—a
woman suffering from bipolar disorder who was prone to violent outbursts and suicide
attempts. The author’s father, relatively more stable, was nonetheless known
for brandishing a gun in public. From her preteen years, Es sought
companionship in her brother Mike’s pot-smoking garage band. This incited her obsession
with drums; introduced her to a relative of John Travolta’s and thus
Scientology; and also led to the loss of her virginity, which offers some of
the memoir’s most heart-wrenching, affecting passages. By age 15, Es was
working for her family’s business but not “exactly” living at home or going to
school. This unconventional upbringing, reminiscent of those found in dark and
quirky autobiographies like Augusten Burroughs’ Running with Scissors, takes up the book’s first half. But in
recounting her adult life, Es truly taps into intriguing self-reflection. She
writes of the moderate success that her band, The Extinct, attained by touring
with comedian Pauly Shore and of her brainwashing in Scientology. Being “in a
band made up of Scientologists? It’s a cult within a cult,” she writes. Even as
it became apparent that she had major health issues and had inherited her
mother’s mental instability, the author refused to seek care, opting for a
Scientologist’s self-reliance. She provides engrossing details about cults,
playing with the peculiar vocabulary of Scientology to craft hilarious and
terrifying illustrations of people constructing their own realities. (One
memorable fight with a boyfriend named Peaches ended with Es screaming “REFUND
CYCLE,” apparently violent words considered a “high crime.”) After her break
with the church, the author eventually found stability in a new relationship
and her art (samples of which are scattered throughout the book) as well as the
voice she used to tell her story, which is simultaneously acerbic, warm, and
funny.