Status
Available
Call number
Genres
Collection
Publication
One (2022), Edition: 1, 224 pages
Description
Fiction. African American Fiction. Literature. 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.… (more)
User reviews
LibraryThing member froxgirl
This collection of massively entertaining stories features Black women in tricky situations: being lovers with a woman who is longing for a husband; meeting a man at a conference and holding him at arm’s length while deciding whether or not he's for real; confusing your mother's minister lover
Quotes: "As a Black woman, you are there playing Count The Negroes as you do at every conference. He is number twelve, at a conference of hundreds."
"If God were to welcome everyone into heaven, your mother would abandon Christianity immediately."
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with God himself; and reaching out to one of your father's many daughters when you've only heard rumors of her existence. There's true Black joy here, exuberant dialogue and quiet moments, and the only regret is that the collection is too short.Quotes: "As a Black woman, you are there playing Count The Negroes as you do at every conference. He is number twelve, at a conference of hundreds."
"If God were to welcome everyone into heaven, your mother would abandon Christianity immediately."
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LibraryThing member RidgewayGirl
Deesha Philyaw's debut, a collection of short stories, is a delight. Focusing on the lives of Black women, often queer, often financially precarious, this collection illuminates lives that are seldom written about. While there are commonalities, the lives Philyaw is writing about are varied and the
In my favorite of the bunch, Snowfall, a woman has moved north with her partner, forging a new life together after her family rejected her. She misses her extended family and the South, never more so than when she and her partner shovel out the driveway early in the morning. In How to Make Love to a Physicist, an art teacher is wary of the interest of the science teacher she meets at a conference. And Peach Cobbler, about a girl growing up with a single mother who bakes for and carries on with the married minister every week, has a companion story later on.
The writing isn't the focus, and neither are the plots; what makes this collection noteworthy lays in how Philyaw establishes a sense of place and in the remarkable characters in her stories. This is a great beginning for a young writer and I'm eager to read what she writes next.
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stories never felt repetitive. In my favorite of the bunch, Snowfall, a woman has moved north with her partner, forging a new life together after her family rejected her. She misses her extended family and the South, never more so than when she and her partner shovel out the driveway early in the morning. In How to Make Love to a Physicist, an art teacher is wary of the interest of the science teacher she meets at a conference. And Peach Cobbler, about a girl growing up with a single mother who bakes for and carries on with the married minister every week, has a companion story later on.
The writing isn't the focus, and neither are the plots; what makes this collection noteworthy lays in how Philyaw establishes a sense of place and in the remarkable characters in her stories. This is a great beginning for a young writer and I'm eager to read what she writes next.
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LibraryThing member muddyboy
A really wonderful collection of short stories with universal appeal. The author goes beyond race and gender preference to bring out the intrinsic humanity of the characters. They are real vibrant people with both their good qualities and flaws. I particularly loved the final story "When Eddie
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Levert Comes" about a woman whose Alzheimer's addled mother waits for the lead singer of the O'Jays to visit her every day. The characters here experience a lot of hurt and struggle to overcome being discounted by others. This is a really powerful book that deserves all the credit it has received. Show Less
LibraryThing member Dreesie
Short stories featuring black women and girls, caught between the expectations of their churches and church-going communities and the realities they see around them, and their own wants and desires.
I enjoyed this and can see why people love it, but I am really not a fan of the short story as a
I enjoyed this and can see why people love it, but I am really not a fan of the short story as a
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format. Give me a novel! Show Less
LibraryThing member bookczuk
Pandemic read. Fantastic. Completely and utterly fantastic. I have some favorites, but will let you find your own.
LibraryThing member BookConcierge
This is the author’s fiction debut, though she has written a number of nonfiction works. In this wonderful collection of short stories, Philyaw explores the modern African-American woman and her hopes, dreams, relationships, and actions both in and away from church. The stories feature all ages,
These “church ladies” write about their love lives, their secret desires, their disappointments, their anger and their joys in stories that range from a professional woman meeting a scientist at a convention, to a woman connecting with a man who, like she, is visiting a mother who is dying, to a young girl who mistakes the preacher who beds her mother for God, to a teenager with a crush on the pastor’s wife (and the great-grandmother who is raising her and worried about her soul), to a woman struggling to care for her mother with dementia, to a lesbian couple struggling to make a go of it in a cold northern city far from home.
Philyaw does a marvelous job of bringing these many characters to life. Even when our circumstances were very different (basically every story), I could still relate to and understand their feelings and actions. I could see a few of these stories expanded to novel length, but I find them satisfying in and of themselves.
I look forward to reading more of her works in the future. In the meantime, I’m gonna have to learn to make peach cobbler …
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from children to great-grandmothers. These “church ladies” write about their love lives, their secret desires, their disappointments, their anger and their joys in stories that range from a professional woman meeting a scientist at a convention, to a woman connecting with a man who, like she, is visiting a mother who is dying, to a young girl who mistakes the preacher who beds her mother for God, to a teenager with a crush on the pastor’s wife (and the great-grandmother who is raising her and worried about her soul), to a woman struggling to care for her mother with dementia, to a lesbian couple struggling to make a go of it in a cold northern city far from home.
Philyaw does a marvelous job of bringing these many characters to life. Even when our circumstances were very different (basically every story), I could still relate to and understand their feelings and actions. I could see a few of these stories expanded to novel length, but I find them satisfying in and of themselves.
I look forward to reading more of her works in the future. In the meantime, I’m gonna have to learn to make peach cobbler …
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LibraryThing member Beth.Clarke
I don't typically read short story collections, but this is an amazing book. The stories have well-rounded characters that go through a variety of life issues. I listened to the audio and found it very easy to follow and engaging.
LibraryThing member eas7788
I find it a little hard to rate because so many people love it and there's also a sense of this was not written for me (in a good way) but the bottom line is each story pulled me in. Occasionally I felt some self-consciousness or stiffness in the writing but it was dead on in establishing real,
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grounded characters with real, compelling conflicts and it worked so well as a collection of stories. Some of the details especially grabbed me like Snowfall's description of growing up and Physicist's description of staying up forever talking to a new person you are drawn to. Show Less
LibraryThing member KatyBee
Excellent collection. Quick read; funny, sad, and honest.
LibraryThing member AKBouterse
A great little book of short stories. Oftentimes with short story collections, there are a few I don't like but I really enjoyed all of these. A couple of the stories, Peach Cobbler and How to Make Love to a Physicist, were really excellent. I would absolutely recommend this!
LibraryThing member Venarain
I would highly recommend the audio book version - the narrator is amazing and the stories are so great.
LibraryThing member miss.mesmerized
Deesha Philyaw’s collection of nine short stories about Black women gives insight in a life behind closed doors, rules unknown to many of us, a secret double life nobody sees or wants to see. The book was a finalist for the 2020 National Book Award for Fiction and was awarded, among others, the
What most women share is the fact that they lead a kind of double life they are forced into. For the outside word, they dress decently, lead a God abiding life, do not speak up and care for their children. Yet, at home, behind the closed door, among themselves, they speak freely, they know that even the clergymen have bodily needs they fulfil. They are not perfect, often far from, but they try to make the best of it and teach their daughters what they need to know about life and its double-standards.
The variety of women we get to know is large, from homosexual spinsters still searching for husbands, over half-sisters mourning their always unfaithful father, to a young girl who finally comes to understand that how easily you can be trapped in a situation where wen exert power over you and your body.
The author captures the decisive moment when desires and religious rules collide. They need to cope with contradictions, build their lives around it, always threatened by the verdict of the public and the parish. They are never free, not even those who try to flee from the south, who work and study hard for a better life - ultimately, it all comes back to them.
The tone is funny at times, desperate and harsh at others, always reflecting the characters’ moods on the one hand, which, on the other, will often not leave their house or even their body. The collection shows a life hidden, a life in the shadow of big and strong men, a life worth narrating.
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PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction and the Los Angeles Book prize. All stories centre around Black women and Christianity highlighting contradictions and hypocrisy and also a group of women who accept their place given to them by powerful men. They all endure the double discrimination of being Black and being a woman – until they don’t anymore. What most women share is the fact that they lead a kind of double life they are forced into. For the outside word, they dress decently, lead a God abiding life, do not speak up and care for their children. Yet, at home, behind the closed door, among themselves, they speak freely, they know that even the clergymen have bodily needs they fulfil. They are not perfect, often far from, but they try to make the best of it and teach their daughters what they need to know about life and its double-standards.
The variety of women we get to know is large, from homosexual spinsters still searching for husbands, over half-sisters mourning their always unfaithful father, to a young girl who finally comes to understand that how easily you can be trapped in a situation where wen exert power over you and your body.
The author captures the decisive moment when desires and religious rules collide. They need to cope with contradictions, build their lives around it, always threatened by the verdict of the public and the parish. They are never free, not even those who try to flee from the south, who work and study hard for a better life - ultimately, it all comes back to them.
The tone is funny at times, desperate and harsh at others, always reflecting the characters’ moods on the one hand, which, on the other, will often not leave their house or even their body. The collection shows a life hidden, a life in the shadow of big and strong men, a life worth narrating.
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LibraryThing member sriddell
Wonderful collection of short stories.
Each story renders a sympathetic peek into the inner lives of church ladies - or sometimes "not quite" church ladies. The enduring relationships with sisters, mothers, aunts, friends are told with warmth, even when some of the relationships are anything but.
I read the stories are being developed into an HBO series, which I can't wait to see!
Each story renders a sympathetic peek into the inner lives of church ladies - or sometimes "not quite" church ladies. The enduring relationships with sisters, mothers, aunts, friends are told with warmth, even when some of the relationships are anything but.
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Relationships with fathers, brothers, husbands and boyfriends are more fleeting and told with head shaking and eye rolling.I read the stories are being developed into an HBO series, which I can't wait to see!
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LibraryThing member dooney
Wonderful, moving, and occasionally eye opening collection of short stories.
LibraryThing member paroof
I picked this book because of the cover and because it was on sale... and the stars aligned and gave me one of the best collections of stories I've ever read. I couldn't put this one down. You need to pick it up, you won't regret it.
LibraryThing member tanyaferrell
This won me over with the first couple of stories and all of the rest were honestly pretty great. There was only one that I didn't enjoy very much which is amazing for a short story collection. I listened to this on audiobook and it was so well performed. The stories are funny and touching and
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remind me of so many definitions of home. Show Less
LibraryThing member Narshkite
Every story is dazzling. Sex, identity, religion, difficult mother daughter relationships, Publix potato salad and sweet tea, what more does anyone need? I listened to the audio, and I think it is particularly well suited to audio (and also the reader, Janina Edwards, is superb.)
"Eula" is absolute
"Not Daniel was a perfect piece of microfiction - Charming and ribald in the space of 6 minutes.
"Dear Sister", while less elegant than Eula, was sassy and smart and a compelling introduction to this complicated mess of a family that I 100% want to join.
"Preach Cobbler" broke my heart into crumbs
"Snowfall" broke what was left of my heart after reading Preach Cobbler; the damage bad religion can do almost outpaces the healing good love can bring.
"How to Make Love to a Physicist" is the story that most touched me personally. I understand this woman who had absorbed the message that she does not deserve love, but I rooted for the man that wanted to show her different."
"Jael" made me laugh and cry, not metaphorically. The surprises in a young girl's diary and the ugliness of fixed ideas of what a girl should be. Being sexually attractive to men and acting on that brings accolades and censure. Ignoring male attention brings the same. Men destroy women, and not wanting men is an abomination. It can all make a girl just a little crazy.
"Instructions for Married Christian Husbands" was tightly crafted and really enjoyable, but this was the one woman in this book I didn't know. That might be a hole in my experience. The women I know who have divided sex from feeling haven't thought things out quite so fully as the MC in this story,
"When Eddie Levert Comes" shows us a mother and daughter where there is love but no liking, a daughter longing for validation, taking on the work of caring for a mother with dementia, and finding that even in dementia only men matter.
"Eula" is absolute
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perfection. Sexy, funny and sad and really physical. Such a sense of immediacy -- I feel like I am in that room with these two women in love."Not Daniel was a perfect piece of microfiction - Charming and ribald in the space of 6 minutes.
"Dear Sister", while less elegant than Eula, was sassy and smart and a compelling introduction to this complicated mess of a family that I 100% want to join.
"Preach Cobbler" broke my heart into crumbs
"Snowfall" broke what was left of my heart after reading Preach Cobbler; the damage bad religion can do almost outpaces the healing good love can bring.
"How to Make Love to a Physicist" is the story that most touched me personally. I understand this woman who had absorbed the message that she does not deserve love, but I rooted for the man that wanted to show her different."
"Jael" made me laugh and cry, not metaphorically. The surprises in a young girl's diary and the ugliness of fixed ideas of what a girl should be. Being sexually attractive to men and acting on that brings accolades and censure. Ignoring male attention brings the same. Men destroy women, and not wanting men is an abomination. It can all make a girl just a little crazy.
"Instructions for Married Christian Husbands" was tightly crafted and really enjoyable, but this was the one woman in this book I didn't know. That might be a hole in my experience. The women I know who have divided sex from feeling haven't thought things out quite so fully as the MC in this story,
"When Eddie Levert Comes" shows us a mother and daughter where there is love but no liking, a daughter longing for validation, taking on the work of caring for a mother with dementia, and finding that even in dementia only men matter.
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LibraryThing member BibliophageOnCoffee
Such a wonderful collection of stories that will definitely stick with me. My favorites in order: Peach Cobbler, Jael, How To Make Love To A Physicist, Dear Sister, When Eddie Levert Comes, and Snowfall. All of the stories are excellent, but those are the ones that I particularly loved. I also
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discovered the song Forever Mine by the O'Jays thanks to this book, so that's an added bonus! Show Less
Awards
National Book Award (Finalist — Fiction — 2020)
LA Times Book Prize (Finalist — 2020)
PEN/Faulkner Award (Finalist — 2021)
The Story Prize (Winner — 2020)
Kirkus Reviews Best Book of the Year (Short Fiction — 2020)
Chicago Public Library Best of the Best: Adults (Selection — 2020)
RUSA CODES Listen List (Selection — 2022)
Language
Original language
English
Original publication date
2020
Physical description
224 p.; 8.9 inches
ISBN
1911590693 / 9781911590699
Similar in this library
DDC/MDS
| 813.6 |