Under the Influence with Jo Piazza

We were promised that if we worked hard enough, checked all the right boxes, and built successful careers, we'd eventually arrive at some stable version of adulthood. So why do so many women in midlife feel like we're teetering on the edge of a cliff.

This week we're joined by writer and cultural critic Amil Niazi, author of Life After Ambition, for a chat about the modern midlife crisis. Not the cliché dude version with sports cars and dramatic reinventions, but the reckoning happening to so many women who have spent decades chasing success only to discover that the old definitions no longer fit.

We chat about aging in industries obsessed with youth, the anxiety of work in an increasingly unstable economy, why ambition may need a complete rebrand, and what happens when we stop measuring success by titles, promotions, and external validation. Most of all, we explore the things that actually sustain us: friendship, community, creativity, family, and the freedom to build an actual life and not just the idea of one.

Get Amil's book Life After Ambition here.

Read her story about Midlife Crisis-ing in End Times here.

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Summer is supposed to be relaxing, so why does it feel like five summers' worth of stress before July even hits? This week, we're pushing back on the algorithm's demands that we all have a "'90s summer" or a "nonna summer" and making the case for opting out of any kind of perfection or summer archetype entirely. We're joined by creator, blogger, and debut novelist Chassity Evans.

We dig into Chassity's wild path to authorship, why she chose self-publishing over the slow grind of querying and traditional publishing, and what it's like to have real-time sales data as an indie author. Plus: our quest to bring badminton back and a tease of a very sexy Sound of Music retelling.

Pre-order The Parisian Heist and grab Pink Sand Summer wherever you get your books.

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Why does Parks and Recreation feel more necessary now than when it first aired?

We're chatting with bestselling author and pop culture journalist Jennifer Keishin Armstrong about the enduring appeal of Leslie Knope, Pawnee, and the sitcom that accidentally became a blueprint for rebuilding community.

We talk about why audiences have embraced earnestness over cynicism, how Amy Poehler helped create one of television's most iconic feminist characters, and what the show's message about friendship, local government, and collective action can teach us today.

This episode is about much more than television. It's about what happens when good people decide to build something together.

Get Jennifer's Book Parks and Rec: The Underdog TV Show That Lit'rally Inspired a Vision for a Better America here.

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Kate Casey, host of Reality Life with Kate Casey returns to the show with recommendations for what to watch right now, from buzzy new documentaries to true crime rabbit holes and reality television that is deliciously bonkers and addictive.

We chat aboutThe Crash, Should I Marry a Murderer?, the surprisingly emotional Martin Short documentary, Kate's latest Housewives obsession, the Martha Moxley case, Spencer Pratt's political future (ed note: we recorded this before the primary), and why some stories stay lodged in our collective imagination for decades.

Listen to Kate's podcast here.

Read Kate's Vanity Fair piece on Martha Moxley here.

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Our friend Stephanie McNeal wrote a truly great piece for Vulture this week called BALLERINA FARM IS HAPPY WITH HER CHOICES. Steph went to the farm and sat down with Hannah inside the homeschooling schoolhouse to talk about everything from being called a tradwife to Yesteryear to who does what in her marriage. It's the best profile of BF and Neeleman we have ever read so we had to get Steph on the show ASAP to chat through it.

Read the piece here.

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Bestselling author Jane Green spent decades looking like she had the perfect life: a beautiful house, a successful career, a long marriage, children, stability, all of it. But behind the scenes she was drowning in financial fear, people pleasing, resentment, perimenopause, and the terrifying feeling that she had completely lost herself.

Then she walked away. She Rewilded herself.

In this deeply honest conversation based on Green's new memoir Rewilding, Jane talks about leaving her marriage, running away to Marrakech, experimenting with mushrooms, tattoos and reinvention in midlife, navigating the hormonal and emotional earthquake of menopause, and learning how to stop caring what everyone else thinks.

Thanks to Bellesa for sponsoring the show! EVERYONE who signs up wins a FREE toy or gift card! Just click the link! https://www.bboutique.co/vibe/undertheinfluence-pod

Get Jane's book REWILDING here.

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Sad beige motherhood helped inspire this podcast.

This week we're diving into the internet aesthetic that convinced an entire generation of mothers that parenting should look like a luxury hotel lobby in Denmark. We talk with Hayley DeRoche, aka The Official Sad Beige and author of Dress Your Baby in Sage and Taupe, about how influencer culture turned motherhood into a perfectly curated performance built on guilt, consumption, and extremely expensive neutral-toned stacking cups.

We get into the rise of sad beige motherhood, stealth wealth aesthetics, why every stroller suddenly costs as much as a used Honda Civic, and how social media sold women the lie that if we just bought the right swaddle, sleep suit, or baby carrier, we could somehow control the total chaos of early parenting.

There’s also a lot about community: why modern motherhood feels so isolating, why moms desperately need real-life support systems instead of influencer advice, and why we may all need to start forming feminist mom communes immediately.

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What if the women from Girls Gone Wild finally got the mic?

This week we go all the way back to the horrifyingly normalized misogyny of the early 2000s with author and podcaster Courtney Kocak, who spent seven deeply unsettling weeks working on the actual Girls Gone Wild tour bus.

Courtney takes us inside the world Joe Francis built: drunk college girls signing contracts they didn’t understand, creepy power dynamics disguised as “fun,” and the moment she realized the entire machine was designed to separate women from their agency while making terrible men rich.

We get into feminism’s branding problem, the manosphere, abortion shame, sex positivity after trauma, why women are exhausted from watching men face zero consequences, and whether the left needs to stop eating its own alive every five seconds online.

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So excited to drop Family Money from Babylist into your feed!

Having a baby comes with real money questions, no matter where you're starting from. Welcome to Family Money, a new podcast from Babylist, because it shouldn't feel like only some people know how to play the game.

Family Money is the podcast about the financial side of family life that parents think about constantly but rarely say out loud. Childcare costs. Saving strategies. What it actually means to give your kids a good life.

Each episode brings together parents, economists, therapists, and financial advisors for the conversations you've been carrying around. No judgment. No shame. Just honest answers.

In our very first episode, we're tackling the question every parent asks: are kids actually more expensive than ever? Yes—but the reason might surprise you. We hear from an economist who reframes what that actually means for your family's finances (hint: you're not burning money, you're investing it), and a mom of three who proves you don't need a huge home, a fancy car, or a perfectly curated nursery to raise a happy family.

Because here's the truth: kids will flip your finances upside down. And they're worth every penny.

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Before there were influencers, there were royals.

For centuries, the British royal family has provided the world with fashion trends, family feuds, public scandals, doomed romances, and enough gossip to fuel generations of headlines. Long before social media, people were obsessing over what royals wore, who they married, and what happened behind palace walls.

Bestselling author Melanie Benjamin joins us to talk about her new novel, The Windsor Affair, which revisits one of the most consequential scandals in modern history: King Edward VIII's decision to give up the throne for Wallis Simpson.

Together we unpack why we're still fascinated by the royals, how the monarchy became the blueprint for celebrity culture, and what really happened between Wallis Simpson and the future Queen Mother, Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon. They also dig into the parallels between Wallis and Meghan Markle, the media's obsession with pitting women against one another, and why history keeps recycling the same female archetypes.

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