Deesha Philyaw
Award-winning Writer
National Book Award Finalist
Readings &
Lecture Topics
- Writing About Journeys Not Your Own
- Good Girls Don’t, Black Girls Will
- Ain’t I a Mommy? Narratives of Motherhood & Race
- The Mythical Sisterhood of Black and White Women
- Choosing You, Telling the Truth
- An Evening with Deesha Philyaw
Biography
“Deesha Philyaw uses the comic, the allegorical, and the geographic to examine Black intimacies and Black secrets. Her work is as rigorous as it is pleasurable to read.” –Kiese Laymon
“Tender, fierce, proudly Black and beautiful.” –Kirkus Reviews
Deesha Philyaw is the author of the debut short story collection The Secret Lives of Church Ladies (West Virginia University Press, 2020), which won the 2021 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, the 2020/2021 Story Prize, and a 2020 LA Times Book Prize: The Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction; the collection was also a finalist for the 2020 National Book Award for Fiction. Her next two books include her highly anticipated debut novel The True Confessions of First Lady Freeman (Mariner Books, 2026), and her second collection Girl, Look, a “poignant new collection, giving a vivid snapshot of the interior lives of Black women across generations, drawing readers to consider Black women and girls’ vulnerabilities, invisibility, and beautiful contradictions, in a post-COVID, post-Breonna Taylor world.”
The Secret Lives of Church Ladies explores the raw and tender places where Black women and girls dare to follow their desires and pursue a momentary reprieve from being good. Nine stories featuring four generations of characters who grapple with who they want to be in the world, the collection was praised as “luminous stories populated by deeply moving and multifaceted characters,” by Kirkus Reviews and “addictive while also laying bare the depth and vulnerability of Black women,” by Observer. Author Tara Campbell notes, “The love in Philyaw’s stories runs the gamut from sweet to bitter, sexy to sisterly, temporary to time tested, often with hidden aspects. The word secret in the title is earned, and some of the secrets are downright juicy.” The Secret Lives of Church Ladies is being adapted for television by HBO Max with Tessa Thompson executive producing.
Philyaw is co-host of two podcasts, Ursa Short Fiction (with Dawnie Walton) and Reckon True Stories (with Kiese Laymon), through Ursa Story company, which Philyaw co-founded with author Dawnie Walton and former Longreads founder and CEO Mark Armstrong. Philyaw and Laymon’s podcast focuses on “the stories we tell and how they impact our culture,” Ursa says.
Philyaw is also a Kimbilio Fiction Fellow and a Baldwin for the Arts Fellow. She currently lives in Miami, FL.
Short Bio
Deesha Philyaw’s debut short story collection, The Secret Lives of Church Ladies, won the 2021 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, the 2020/2021 Story Prize, and the 2020 LA Times Book Prize: The Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction and was a finalist for the 2020 National Book Award for Fiction. The Secret Lives of Church Ladies focuses on Black women, sex, and the Black church, and is being adapted for television by HBO Max with Tessa Thompson executive producing. Philyaw is also a Kimbilio Fiction Fellow, a Baldwin for the Arts Fellow, and co-host of two podcasts, Ursa Short Fiction (with Dawnie Walton) and Reckon True Stories (with Kiese Laymon).
Philyaw’s debut novel, The True Confessions of First Lady Freeman, is forthcoming from Mariner Books, an imprint of HarperCollins, in 2026.
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Publications
The Secret Lives of Church Ladies
Short Stories, 2020
The Secret Lives of Church Ladies explores the raw and tender places where Black women and girls dare to follow their desires and pursue a momentary reprieve from being good. The nine stories in this collection feature four generations of characters grappling with who they want to be in the world, caught as they are between the church’s double standards and their own needs and passions. There is fourteen-year-old Jael, who has a crush on the preacher’s wife. At forty-two, Lyra realizes that her discomfort with her own body stands between her and a new love. As Y2K looms, Caroletta’s “same time next year” arrangement with her childhood best friend is tenuous. A serial mistress lays down the ground rules for her married lovers. In the dark shadows of a hospice parking lot, grieving strangers find comfort in each other. With their secret longings, new love, and forbidden affairs, these church ladies are as seductive as they want to be, as vulnerable as they need to be, as unfaithful and unrepentant as they care to be, and as free as they deserve to be.
Co-Parenting 101: Helping Your Kids Thrive in Two Households After Divorce
Self Help, 2013
A successful co-parenting relationship is as vital to your child’s well-being and health as nutritious food or proper exercise. Research, anecdotal evidence, and plain common sense all point to the fact that children are happier, healthier, and better adjusted when both of their parents play an active role in their lives. Studies also show that the trauma children experience in the wake of a divorce or separation can be lessened when they see their parents getting along. Kids whose parents successfully co-parent feel more secure than those who have limited or no connection to one of their parents post divorce. Co-Parenting 101 is based on the premise that co-parenting is a must, not an option. The involvement of both parents―not just the primary guardian―is the cornerstone of successful co-parenting. This is the first book written by a formerly married couple for whom co parenting is central to their day to day lives, and it offers a comprehensive, personal, and upfront look at how to effectively raise kids with an ex-spouse. Authors Deesha Philyaw and Michael D. Thomas, the creators of the popular co-parenting website, co-parenting101.org, share their own experiences raising their children together, as well as provide professional advice from co-parenting experts. Through practical tips combined with expert parental strategies, this book a great resource for divorced parents with children. For parents, less time stressed out about legal wrangling means more time to be fully present and engaged with the children. By learning to put their animosity aside, parents can focus on putting their kids first.
Articles & Audio
Read What’s In Print
• Kiese Laymon and Deesha Philyaw Launch New Podcast – Kirkus Reviews
• Author Deesha Philyaw has a 7-figure deal for her next two books – ABC News
• The Best Black History Month Reads, According To This Year’s Debut Authors – Bustle
• The Secret Lives of Church Ladies, with Deesha Philyaw – Book Dreams
• How Literary Gatekeepers Can Advocate For Black Trans Women – Electric Lit
• Deesha Philyaw recipient of 2020 LA Times Book Prize – LA Times
• The Secret Lives of Church Ladies longlisted for PEN / Faulkner Award – PEN
• Pittsburgh’s People of the Year 2020: Literature – Pittsburgh City Paper
• Tessa Thompson adapts The Secret Lives Of Church Ladies for HBO Max – Deadline
• The Secret Lives of Church Ladies a Finalist for the National Book Award – NBA
• Review of The Secret Lives of Church Ladies by Deesha Philyaw – Kirkus Reviews
• A Conversation with Deesha Philyaw – Literary Mama
• Review The Secret Lives of Church Ladies by Deesha Philyaw – Star Tribune
• All the Church Ladies Are Having Secret Sex – Electric Literature
Listen to Audio
• Series 3 Episode 1: Deesha Philyaw – Morley Radio
• Woven Stories and Open Letters: from Micro a Podcast for Powerful Writing – LitHub
Selected Writings
• Read “The Secret Lives of Church Ladies” – Buzzfeed
• “Blink and You Miss Her” by Deesha Philyaw – fractured lit
• Read “Forecast for Sex by 50 When You Are a 46 Year Old Black Woman” – McSweeney’s
“I Am Not My Ancestors” by Deesha Philyaw (an excerpt)
Jada wasn’t sure exactly when sex after a long day of protesting had become a thing for her and Victor. But it was their thing. Without saying a word, they seemed to agree there was no need to let all that residual energy and rage go to waste. That’s how deep their bond went. Problem was, like most 20-year-olds they knew, they both lived at home with old-school Black parents who didn’t play that coed sleepover shit when they were in high school and were just as devoted to cock-blocking when their kids came home from college. So Jada and Victor parked behind Walmart and made vigorous love next to their “We Have Nothing to Lose But Our Chains” signs.
Afterward, Victor drove Jada home. Before she got out of the car, she fluffed her Afro back into place and kissed Victor goodnight. She blasted through the front door and sprinted to her bedroom, dodging her parents who sat in the living room watching TV. Jada’s mother had a nose like a bloodhound and had complained more than once about Jada coming home after a protest smelling like she was “fresh off the streets,” whatever that meant. Jada didn’t want to have to explain why she smelled like she was fresh off Victor’s backseat.
In her bedroom, she stepped out of her sneakers, stripped out of her sweaty t-shirt, jeans, panties and bra, and left them in a pile on the floor. She stood in front of her full-length mirror, took four pictures in various poses, all her best approximations of seductive. She texted the nudes to Victor, then threw on her robe and went to shower.
Once clean, Jada tip-toed downstairs to get a glass of water. From the living room, she could hear some pundit on Fox News complaining about “race baiters” and her father calling the man a goddamn son of a bitch, as if the goddamn son of a bitch could hear him through the TV. Her father was only allowed one supervised hour of Fox News per day, doctor’s orders. “Dear…dear…” Jada heard her mother pleading.
Jada thought about going in and staging another intervention, but thought better of it. She was tired. So she headed up to bed.
The wall along the stairwell was covered in family photos her mother had organized chronologically, from sepia images of Jada’s maternal great-grandparents in front of a sharecropper’s shack, all the way up to Jada’s high school graduation photos. Her ‘fro had been less impressive then, and like her politics, burgeoning. She’d met Victor on the first day of college classes on the quad. By month’s end, they were having sex between classes and leading Movement actions together. Jada loved Victor, and she knew he loved her back, even though he never said it. His heart belonged to the Movement, and Jada was part of the Movement. So…yeah.
Back in her bedroom, Jada checked her phone. Victor had left her nudes on “read.” She hated when he did that. She tossed the phone next to her pillow and climbed into bed. She blew three kisses to the Holy Trinity of pictures on her nightstand…Megan Thee Stallion…Assata Shakur…Beyoncé. Then she turned off her lamp.
