Author Deesha Philyaw rocked the literary scene back in 2020 with “The Secret Lives of Church Ladies.” The juicy, short-story collection earned her a PEN/Faulkner award, an LA Times Book Prize and made her a finalist for National Book Awards. Her long-awaited, debut novel is getting a lot of buzz.
“The True Confessions of First Lady Freeman” is about a woman who grew up poor and becomes wealthy as the first lady of a megachurch. But money doesn’t buy her happiness. She enters a national beauty pageant for first ladies, and gets caught up in a big scandal. Her husband is more married to the church than to her. And all kinds of secrets unfold.
Like Deesha’s first book, “The True Confessions of First Lady Freeman” explores issues such as class, misogyny and sexuality in the Black church. Several years ago, Deesha spent close to a year in West Oakland.
Host Jeneé Darden spoke with Deesha about her new book.
