Jo Piazza Test Wrote a Book on Substack and it's about to Become a Bestseller

A sweet-as-pie interview with the author of EVERYONE IS LYING TO YOU

I have a treat for you today, fellow WTFers! (First time trying that moniker! Does it work? Let me know in the comments. How cheeky should I get with this rebrand?)

Dynamo author Jo Piazza stopped moving for a moment to answer some questions about her new book, Everyone Is Lying To You, and I'm sharing them with you here. The girl is biz-eeeee, let me tell you. Books, podcasts, Substack, travel, young children—she voraciously lives life well. Jo also makes smart use of technology and has a supportive partner, Nick Aster, whom she often credits. When we’re together later this month (I’m joining her in Philly for her local Barnes and Noble event), I intend to sleuth out why he has two names, like Jay Gatsby. Anyway, the point is, one of my favorite things about the fabulous Jo Piazza is that she’s honest and transparent, and makes it clear that all that zesty living takes a team. She’s not shy about it—or anything.

Before I get to our interview, I want to tell you why this book is personally dear to me for several reasons, not the least of which is pie. It’s the perfect choice for debuting a new feature: author interviews and book reviews relevant to our deconstruction journeys. I’m also noodling on a book club and discussion group.

This Isn’t Grandma’s Pie Crust.

Back when I was first working on my book proposal for A Well-Trained Wife—which is a real-life trad wife suspense story—I had some dreams and visions for my authorial career. One of them was to write a New York Times Bestseller. Another was to blurb someone else’s bestselling book. I had several of these little benchmarks I wanted to manifest, and even listed them on my publicist’s spreadsheet two years later, when the book had sold, been edited, and designed, and was ready for promotion. Another way was to be on as many mainstream podcasts as possible. I knew that to reach the widest audience possible, AWTW needed to stretch beyond our hashtag deconstruction stomping grounds.

Enter Ms. Jo Piazza with her tart and spicy vibrancy, eager to talk to me about trad wives on her podcast, Under the Influence. Even though I was experienced on the podcast circuit, the invite from Jo signalled an overlap into wider mainstream culture, and I was surprised to hear from a cultural commentator interested in the daily grind of a trad wife’s life.

I was also really happy about it. Drumming up mainstream interest in the Christian Patriarchy’s agenda and intention to take over our government and society is what I’m after. I knew Jo was coming at this from a very different worldview—traveled, educated, and not from the South. Those voters are precisely the people I want to warn, because they don’t have the life experience in high-control religion and trad life burned into their psyche. The fundies come off weird yet fascinating to them, and they need to know how the power of fundamentalist influence is changing our world.

Jo’s exposure helped AWTW become an instant New York Times Bestseller. She didn’t just raise awareness for my book; she raised the tide in the waters I sailed my book into. I’m so grateful. And so began an ongoing conversation, dipping in and out of our busy lives to catch up on trad wives and how the Christian Patriarchy is impacting our news.

What I was witnessing was Jo’s masterclass in real-time research firsthand. She began testing a novel idea on Substack, and to the best of my knowledge, she was the first to do so. As a writer, I trembled for her! We generally shelter our works in progress and avoid sharing our hot ideas publicly. Here she was—spilling the tea in real time, in public, for a sizzling idea not yet sold, while still promoting her current bestseller, The Sicilian Inheritance! Bold. Badass. Brave: 3 Bs that spell “Jo.’’

Confession: I cried a little at my desk when her email came a few weeks later, asking me to read her manuscript draft and consider blurbing it. Here was a seasoned NYT Bestseller, asking a debut memoirist and REAL FORMER TRAD WIFE, to blurb her splashy, sassy, trad wife murder mystery, currently under construction. I felt honored, valued, seen, heard, and also very….released? Is that the word?

Listen. If you follow my work, you’ve heard me say: We don’t have to always cry our trauma out—we can also laugh it out. Dance it out. Yalp it out! Just get it out. Exposing abuse can be serious, but it can also be campy, witty, fiery, fierce, and full of snark. Reading EVERYONE IS LYING TO YOU was cathartic because this book is all of the above. I know that when I can laugh at something that used to paralyze me with fear, I’m the victor. I won.

My words for the blurb came easily:

“Can an influencer still be influenced?” And can she be persuaded to kill?

These questions in Jo Piazza’s immersive new murder mystery hover in the pages like the scent of freshly baked sourdough bread. Paced like a new egg-apron going viral, EVERYONE IS LYING TO YOU is Gone Girl…but make it trad wives. Piazza nails the Quiverful trad wife persona, the duality and secret-keeping behind the glossy aesthetic, as well as what it’s like to be in main character Lizzie’s shoes—on the outside looking in, wondering why living like a pretty Puritan dripping in children and chickens can be simultaneously so disturbing and yet hypnotically attractive. Trad wives have mad skills and Piazza lets these women sparkle like freshly squeezed sunshine on a lemon-scented farm table. These women are not here to play.

—Tia Levings, author of New York Times Bestselling A Well-Trained Wife: My Escape from Christian Patriarchy

Looky. You can see what they did with it, inadvertently helping me check off one of my little author goals: blurbing someone else’s bestseller.

The Interview with Jo Piazza:

Tia: It seems like you got going on this story, on Substack originally, pretty quickly after releasing The Sicilian Inheritance. What tipped you into the idea?

Jo: I've been covering tradwives on social media since they started popping up in earnest in my feed about two years ago, and honestly, I thought it would be a blip on the digital radar. The lasting power and the growth have floored me. I was just launching The Sicilian Inheritance when I decided to play with the idea of writing some tradwife fiction, but at first, I thought it would just be for my Substack subscribers. The world, with its soft filters, lies, and faux realities, felt so ripe for a murder mystery. I was also massively inspired by Harrison Butker's terrible graduation speech, where he told women their highest purpose in life was to be a wife and a mother. I thought, what if I rewrote that scene with the woman yelling back at him? That was an actual inspiration for a scene in the book!

Tia: As we’ve discussed, the realities of trad wife life can be pretty heavy. Yet EILTY has a definite “juiciness” factor and plenty of side-eye. How did you lean into that plot and character development?

Jo: The realities of trad life and the Christian conservative movement have some very dark undertones. And this book doesn't shy away from that. But I also wanted it to be juicy and pulpy, the kind of thing you can devour on the beach. My biggest goal was to make the female characters and their struggles relatable. I think we can all relate to feeling shamed by some of the faux-reality we see on social media, the feelings that we don't measure up. And then there are other characters, women struggling to do what is right for their families and their own ambitions.

And amidst it all, we have this crazy world of Instagram influencers who make more money the more they lie to you about their own lives. I wrapped all of that in a juicy murder mystery to get this book into as many hands as possible. Because my hope is that readers will first of all enjoy it and second of all question the kinds of content we are being served right now on social media that wants to make women smaller and take away our rights.

Tia: So many authors are afraid to show their work. What was it like teasing this novel, or testing the market, on a new platform like Substack while it was still developing? What would you tell other writers considering the same?

Jo: It was pretty awesome to be honest. I've never been precious about my work, probably because I was a tabloid newspaper reporter for so long, and I had to constantly produce and put it all out there quickly. Putting this on my Substack really let me figure out what readers wanted in this kind of book and then tweak it as I went along. It was very collaborative, which in this book market felt like the right direction to go.

Tia: You have an enormous tour planned for EILTY! What are some of the experiences you’re most looking forward to?

Jo: I love talking to readers so much. It is my greatest joy as a writer. Getting to have these conversations in person and offline is magical. Plus I get to be with you and have you visit me in Philly which I am so excited about. I'm also turning parts of this into fun family trips with my kids, as it's also summer. As a mom of three under the age of 8, I want them to have a great summer while also seeing me fulfill my dreams.

Tia: Are you already cooking the next book? Any hints?

Jo: I am finishing the second draft edits on my new novel right now. It's called The Parisian Heist, and it is another dual timeline book like The Sicilian Inheritance. In the present day, it is a feminist art heist and a group of art students trying to take down the world's largest art criminal enterprise, and in the past, it is the untold story of Jo van Gogh, who inherited all of Vincent's paintings when she was a young widow. They were worthless, and she had to find a way to carry on his legacy to support herself and her young child.

Tia: Jo van Gogh?! Gosh, I can’t wait for that. I’m hoping to get more art worked into my platform. More of the humanities, please! Also, more pie!

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