Creative Coffee Emma Gannon

I really enjoy Emily McDowell’s honest take on creative grief, career identity, life transitions and quitting. She has a brilliant podcast called Quitted that she hosted with her pal and fellow Substacker Holly Whitaker. One of my favourite episodes is titled ‘Emily McDowell quits being a human brand.' (On that note, Emily and Holly have just launched a new workshop on how to help you navigate “the deep shitty middle” of transitions. These are two women who know the score, who have been there in the thick of it, and I’m excited that they are bringing their wisdom forth in this way.)
I love Emily’s views on how we can reframe quitting as a negative thing and instead embrace the bravery it takes to say goodbye to something. Quitting something can be painful but it can allow us to move forward into a new space. She recently wrote an excellent Substack post about the word ‘completion’ when it comes to quitting a job/project/thing: “in conversations about quitting, failure, and walking away, there’s a word and concept I think is underused: completion.”
I also like this line she wrote: “What if, instead of a line that goes perpetually up and to the right, with the goal of reaching a future point of “success” — the point of being alive is expansion?”
I don’t know about you, but the words ‘completion’ and ‘expansion’ make so much more sense to our human psyches, right? More so than arbitrary ‘success’ and ‘achievement’ and ‘climbing’? Maybe there’s an easier way to look at things.
Hope you enjoy this conversation with Emily! This episode is focused on the process of melting down a career and re-building it, slowly. If you like it, please consider leaving a little review on Apple podcasts, it helps more people discover this newsletter and podcast. Thank you! Toodles! ♡It’s Nice That: creative grief and how to deal with itYou can follow Emily’s Substack here. Check out Emily’s new workshop here.Check out A Year of Nothing here.


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I read the book Matrescence in two days. It was as though I was reading a thriller, I really couldn’t put it down. I felt a compulsion to keep reading that I hadn’t felt in years. It is a book about motherhood, written by Lucy Jones, but more than that, it’s a book about metamorphosis. You don’t need to be a mother to find it utterly captivating, and yet it is clearly a book that will make those who have given birth feel specifically seen.
It’s a book about change, transition and how we become new people with each and every catalytic event we go through in life. I loved this honest book which reads as part-memoir part-science/nature writing — on what actually happens to the human female body and psyche pre-, during and post- birth.
The book feels incredibly fresh and radical — many books are written about motherhood but this is the only book I’ve read thus far that zooms intimately into the personal memoir aspect and zooms out to see the bigger animal-kingdom territory and beautifully captures the way in which women break apart and are put back together again anew. It made me see my friends who are mothers in a new brutal and beautiful light, and it made me want to spotlight these honest conversations between women no matter what stage of life we are at.
I hope you enjoy this episode with Lucy. We talk about writing, motherhood, creativity, child-like wonder and how to keep a fresh perspective on the world.
Articles we mention in the podcast:
— Lucy’s book Matrescence (out now in paperback)— My book A Year of Nothing— Elena Ferrante talks to Marina Abramović — Motherhood is no threat to creativity, author Zadie Smith says— Don’t Play With Your Kids - New York Times


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Jenn Romolini and I are kindred spirits across the pond. In 2016/2017, we both wrote a memoir/guide about our respective online careers and how to navigate a world when you feel slightly ‘different’ to everyone else around you who seems to follow the sensible path. Mine was called Ctrl Alt Delete: How I Grew Up Online and hers was called Weird in a World That’s Not. Cut to now, all these years on, we released similar books around the same time again. I wrote The Success Myth all about how jaded and confused I felt when outside success didn’t match up with how I felt on the inside; and Jenn wrote Ambition Monster, a forensic memoir that deep-dives into her childhood trauma and how this turned into a life of hamster-wheel workaholism. The memoir is fast-paced, wise, vulnerable, gritty, retrospective and funny. It also has moments that feel spiritual and full of satisfying epiphanies— it is a woman awakening, and it is a wake up call to the reader. Our work and life experiences are, of course, very different on paper — but I always felt like we were tapped into the same sort of themes, albeit living totally different lives in London and LA.
I’m thrilled that I got to sit down for a chat with Jenn for this podcast, and I got to spend time with her in New York too. I hope you enjoy this episode and grab a copy of the book, too! xoxo


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Welcome to the first episode of my new podcast exclusive to The Hyphen: Creative Coffee with Emma Gannon. This is a Substack-only podcast focusing on writers and their creative process, discussed over a laid back coffee.
My first conversation is with the brilliant Farrah Storr, head of writer partnerships at Substack who runs Things Worth Knowing, a newsletter always full of interesting essays, tips and guest columns that reaches over 40k readers weekly. I wanted to interview Farrah for multiple reasons — one being that our newsletter readers have a big crossover on this platform (according to the geeky stats) so we thought our readers would enjoy this collaboration, and plus Farrah genuinely cares about writers having success on Substack. She works behind the scenes at the company and runs her own (thriving) newsletter on the side. She is also, like many of us, really over the endless onslaught of short form content.
“Writing suddenly got rechristened ‘content’. And ‘content’ felt just wrong. I didn’t want listicles. I didn’t want as much ‘content’ as you my optic nerve could handle. I didn’t want another ‘hot take’. I wanted to connect. I wanted nuance. I wanted honesty and I wanted points of view that were perhaps not always reflected in the mainstream press. But more than that, I wanted a community.” — Farrah Storr

From the decades working at the top in women’s media, she is really in-the-know on how to grow a writer’s brand, how to stand out and generate ideas, how to spot trends, and plus she is generous in sharing hidden gems. I am someone who is very bad at doing prior research before going anywhere so I use Farrah’s newsletter as a place for quality recommendations. For example, the most useful things to pack in your suitcase, or all the best spots to visit in Paris that haven’t yet been TikTokified, or the best UK cosy staycation places that resemble that cottage in The Holiday. She also writes in tandem with cultural moments, such as how her and husband are the real “One Day” story when the Netflix series aired, which then got picked up as a big mainstream media piece a few days later.
Reminder: This new podcast is only accessible to my Hyphen members, I made it for you and your support means it will remain ad-free. The premise is super simple: coffee and chat with a guest on the topic of creativity. If you want access to all upcoming episodes, then make sure you’re signed up as a paid subscriber to The Hyphen.
A housekeeping note: Most people voted for these podcast updates to be included in the Sunday Scroll emails you already receive instead of dedicated posts — so I will honour that for any new episodes! For the other half of you who wanted weekly updates instead, make sure you keep an eye on the app if you want to be notified on every new post I publish. ♡
The Creative Coffee podcast series is going to be pretty cosy and intimate for the most part (I wanted it to be something I could make from home) — however: when I was offered the wonderful chance to host a live recording of the podcast in central London (in a library room in Conway Hall no less!) I, of course, said yes!
Thank you so much to everyone who attended the event, it was so lovely to see you in person and raise a glass to the magic of the Substack community. This episode is slightly different in ~vibe~ to the other episodes (because we are literally on stage; my usual set-up is me at home in a massive jumper) — but I absolutely loved it, it felt so special to bring you along with me as I recorded the first one. Enjoy!
Links to a few things discussed in the episode:
* Farrah’s book The Discomfort Zone
* Farrah’s Substack Things Worth Knowing
* Farrah’s post about how gardening helps her grow
* My books A Year of Nothing and The Success Myth
* Farrah on BBC Radio 5 live speaking about a lack of friendship
* May Sarton’s journal: At Eighty-Two published in 1997
* My post experimenting w

I’m back with a new podcast!
18 months after closing down my previous show Ctrl Alt Delete, I’m back in a different way.
I’m starting from scratch, which may surprise some people. Why not launch my new podcast to an existing RSS feed that over the years reached thirteen million people?
Because I’m not interested in reaching as many people as possible— I’m interested in building this community here on Substack, as organically as possible. I’m interested in sharing honest conversations, making something a bit rougher round the edges; less of a formal interview, less of a script/schedule and just embracing more of an open dialogue on how we make creative work in this economy. (You know everything I wrote in my book The Success Myth about my definitions of success changing… I meant it.)
This new podcast will be for Hyphen paid subscribers only. Even the most basic of podcasts usually require some upfront investment (artwork design, illustration, editing services, music license, occasional travel expenses for guests etc) so your support is how this newsletter keeps its lights on (thank you!) The illustration is the work of and the design is by Paul Storrie.
The new podcast is called Creative Coffee because that’s simply what it is: I will be talking to my guests about creativity as though we are having a coffee together. It’s all about the big and small things that make up a creative life. You can listen to the trailer here and the first episode will be shared on Sunday.
(If you want to receive and listen to the first episode — sign up as a member to The Hyphen now.)
This is a laid back, honest, no-frills podcast with fellow creatives/writers— simply an extension of this newsletter on the themes of The Hyphen: creativity, wellbeing, work, how to live a fulfilling and content life.
Writing is my number one love and my creative priority — but it’s also pretty solitary being a writer and can be a bit lonely at times when you’re in the middle of a difficult project, so it’s really nice to chat away with a fellow writer over a coffee — and it turns out I don’t want to leave podcasting behind completely.
The first episode will be available on Sunday. It was recorded live on stage with writer and former editor-in-chief Farrah Storr — with many brilliant Hyphen readers in attendance. It was a really special evening, so thank you to everyone who came along. We recorded it in a beautiful library room at Conway Hall in central London. It’s been a while since I’ve done something of that nature, and everyone was so kind and welcoming. A friend produced it, who recorded my first ever live episode of Ctrl Alt Delete in the basement of Tottenham Court Road Waterstones back in 2016. I’m so lucky to have amazing friends who I’ve met along the way, who I am so grateful for. It’s all a bit full circle, really.
Now — some housekeeping! Do you want to receive each new episode as a standalone post in your inbox — or would you just prefer me to tell you about new episodes in my Sunday Scroll round-ups (i.e less emails for you). I’ll go with the most popular vote:
Excited to bring you this! ♡


This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit thehyphen.substack.com/subscribe