Joya Goffney

Joya Goffney grew up in New Waverly, a small town in East Texas. In high school, she challenged herself with to-do lists full of risk-taking items, like “hug a random boy” and “eat a cricket,” which inspired her debut novel, Excuse Me While I Ugly Cry, followed by her acclaimed second book, Confessions of an Alleged Good Girl, both of which received starred reviews and stellar buzz from BookRiot, PopSugar, Buzzfeed, and YALSA Best Fiction and Kirkus Best Book accolades. With a passion for Black social psychology, she moved out of the countryside to attend the University of Texas in Austin and has since settled in Houston.