And I'm curious, looking back now, what was difficult about writing your second novel? And how did you move through that difficulty?

Gosh, I feel honestly like I could answer all of these questions for like five hours, like a full therapy session.

But no, with Table for One, it's so weird as well because that book has such a light energy to it.

Like it's in all the W.H. Smith airports at the moment and people are enjoying it.

And it's like, I'm really proud of it.

But it was awful to write.

It was terrible.

Why now? Why this book?

She's written extensively about the connection between loneliness and solitude, and that's in part because Emma is a huge fan of alone time.

It's such a nuanced topic because loneliness and solitude are so different.

You can be lonely in a crowded room.

You can be lonely in a marriage.

You can be lonely at a party.

When you're feeling lonely, I believe it's because you're really disconnected from yourself.

You feel lonely inside yourself, like you feel lonely because no one understands you, and you don't even understand you.

When you think of an experience like traveling alone or dining alone, how does that differ when you're with another person?

Mm

... "No, not happening." And I think sometimes it's good to lean into that and just accept it.

Close the laptop, go for a long walk, listen to a podcast.

You know, my theory about creativity is that you have to get good stuff going in for good stuff to come out, and so it's really important.

It's like a diet, like a media diet.

It's like, go and read an amazing novel.

Go and read, go and listen to, like, two scriptwriters talking about writing their scripts.

She wants to know, "Does swimming or nature help your creativity, and where's your favorite place to swim?"

[upbeat music] I'd love to hear a little bit of Creative Compass from you if you'd be happy to read.

Yes, definitely.

Okay.

During the summer of 2010, I was in my early 20s and went on a date with someone from work.

We had gone to a cinema in Central London to watch the documentary Bill Cunningham New York.

Bill was the beloved street photographer for The New York Times, best known for his devotion to capturing sartorial beauty on the urban streets and being pals with industry icons such as Iris Apfel and Aletta Sherman.

In the documentary, we follow him through his daily life, riding his trusted bicycle around Manhattan.

But often if I think what I would do, a lot of that is just the ability to be healthy, to have a sharp sense of mind, to be able to move, and actually, like, what I would make today.

Mm.

I also don't think I know more than anyone else, so I'm turning it back on them.

I'm like, "Well, what do you think?" And they're kind of shocked that I'm doing that because I think we still live in this, like, guru culture of there's a lot of money to be made and a lot of courses to be sold to tell people how to live their life, and I just am not interested in that whatsoever.

And it was interesting with A Year Of Nothing, which is more ...

Like, it's not self-help at all.

It's like a narrative nonfiction short memoir, and yet I was still met with this, "Okay.

But how do I get through my burnout?" And it's like, I don't know.

So how has kind of stepping away from the traditional publishing machine really helped you, and what has that given you that you wouldn't have been able to do through the traditional publishing route?

Here she is.

You asked me about artist dates, and I love them.

I read Julia Cameron's book, The Artist's Way, where she talks about artist dates.

But I feel like I've been doing it for so long without kind of giving it a label, but I suppose I call them solo creative boosts.

Like, this idea of just being completely alone in your own company, having delicious solitude, and just that ability to have utter freedom in not having any plans and just pottering around.

Two of my favorite places to go, I would say, is this little hotel in Somerset, and also I go to Penzance because I find the train journey, which is about five hours from London, uh, really creatively stimulating.

And I love listening to songs and writing in my journal and reading books and just getting really, you know, a, into a lot of things that I don't have normally time to read, I suppose.

Yeah.

They're normally the side character.

They're normally the sister.

It's like, no, this is, this is a book called Olive about a childfree by choice woman.

But, um, some people also didn't like her and called her selfish and called her, um, you know, someone that's, like, self-indulgent and wants to take up so much space in her life.

And I think that's still a taboo.

You know, women that want to really live on their own terms, like fully, do whatever they want, that's new.

Hmm.

have to like push through things and toughen up sometimes we can use our resilience to get through things but other times I think it's really detrimental to to push through when we're not that sort of person

yeah no I totally agree and actually even when you said armor I was like oh I don't know if it is about armor actually is it sometimes it's about taking the armor off and being like I don't know.

With my year of nothing, what was so empowering about it is I knew the smallest amount of budget of money I needed because I wasn't working as much.

My overheads were lessened.

So I didn't do as much.

I didn't go out for dinner as much, whatever.

But I knew what I need.

Everyone's