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Fellow Empresses, how’s the queendom holding up? Was this week crazy, or what? Does your nervous system feel like calamari at a dive bar?
There’s a particular fantasy many of us share in midlife: one of quiet contemplation among books. A sunlit library. A kettle always on. The soft thrum of pages turning and the reassuring feeling that stories might, somehow, help us make sense of the world.
While has long since disabused me of this notion with her hilarious posts about how much time she spent unclogging loos and fax machines as a public librarian… For , the sunlit fantasy seems to have finally become real.
After nearly two decades as one half of the legendary sex-advice duo Em & Lo, she traded the world of columns and cultural commentary for the charged microcosm of a middle-school library. As it turns out, shepherding tweens through the stacks can be just as controversial as writing about nookie, but so much more satisfying.
Emma’s first novel, No One You Know, explores a different kind of library entirely—the emotional archive between mothers and daughters. It’s a deeply resonant story about grief, identity, and the fragile narratives families build to survive loss. Reading it, many mothers will feel the electric recognition of raising a teenage daughter: the love, the bewilderment, the sudden awareness that the child you’re trying to protect is also becoming someone entirely her own.
We were delighted to invite Emma into the Empress Questionnaire—our ongoing conversation with women who are writing their own second acts.
About Emma
Emma Tourtelot is the author of eight nonfiction books about sex and relationships. Over the years, she has penned regular columns for New York, Glamour, and The Guardian, among others. She was also the co-creator of Nerve Personals and co-hosted a ten-episode television series in the UK based on one of her books.
Time magazine called her first book “this generation’s smarter, funnier, and raunchier version of The Joy of Sex,” while the Sun in England dubbed Em & Lo “New York’s coolest sexperts.”
After nearly twenty years as a sex-advice writer, Emma made a surprising career pivot: she went back to school in her forties to become a middle-school librarian—a role she jokes has turned out to be far more controversial than her first career.
She lives in the Hudson Valley with her husband and their two teenage children.
No One You Know is her first novel.
About the Book
No One You Know (She Writes Press, January 2026, with a gorgeous cover design by ) is a haunting dual-narrative mother-daughter novel about the ripple effects of tragedy in a small town—and the search for meaning after loss.
Kate’s life in the Hudson Valley looks picture-perfect: a thriving career as a realtor-slash-momfluencer, a devoted husband, and a close bond with her brilliant teenage daughter, Indie. But when Indie’s best friend dies suddenly, the illusion of their idyllic town begins to fracture.
As Kate and her husband struggle to regain their footing, Indie—alone in her grief—falls down an online rabbit hole of nihilism and existential despair. Meanwhile, Kate must confront the uncomfortable gap between her carefully curated online persona and the raw grief tearing through her family.
When long-buried family secrets begin to surface, Kate is forced to question everything she thought she understood about marriage, motherhood, and the stories we tell ourselves in order to survive.
Author Jenny Offill calls the novel:
“A heartbreaking, keenly observed novel about love and loss and all the territories in between.”
With any luck, it will be the next book you recommend to everyone you know.
The Empress Questionnaire
1. What is your idea of perfect midlife happiness (or bliss)?
Hanging out in front of our wood stove with my husband and our teenage kids on a snow day, about to take the first sip of my latte.
2. Which empress, queen, goddess, or mythical figure do you most identify with?
Elizabeth II. She was a complicated woman—I’m not sure she was the best mother!—but she had a heroic sense of duty. I admired her keep-calm-and-carry-on approach to life. I lived in England until I was sixteen, so she was the queen I grew up with.
3. Which living midlife woman do you most admire?
She is so goddamn funny. And such a warm and generous writer, especially about this stage of life for women. I cannot read a book without a sense of humor, in any genre—and she just knocks it out of the park.
4. What aspect of midlife or the peri/menopausal journey do you most deplore?
The way staying healthy feels like a part-time job now. There are far too many appointments I’m supposed to make and heavy weights I’m supposed to lift. Plus all the podcasts I’m supposed to listen to.
And then there’s the fact that my daughter will be leaving home in the fall, and my son three years after that. I’m not okay with that!
5. What do you most treasure about this phase of life?
Getting to hang out with my teenagers, who are actually incredibly fun to talk to now.
And the nice thing is that they don’t want to hang out with me all the time—because I can be very annoying (I’m their mom)—so I still have plenty of time to write books and drink my latte in peace.
6. If you could share one key midlife lesson?
I went back to school a decade ago, in my early forties, to become a school librarian. I had to reteach myself math just to take the GRE—I couldn’t even remember how to find the area of a circle.
And then I kind of hated my job the first year. Classroom management is really hard, and you can’t learn that in school.
But now, more than eight years in, I think I have the best job in the world.
It’s never too late to learn something new—or find something you love.
7. What gives you the greatest sense of agency in midlife?
Knowing that I can connect directly with readers online. Women of a certain age are taking media back for themselves, and so many of them have been incredibly generous and supportive as I try to get the word out about No One You Know.
8. Give us the headline for your Empress Age.
Greenlight Yourself. ✨
Emma’s Empress Edit
Some women carry lip gloss. Emma Tourtelot carries library cards, Wordle scores, and a lifelong devotion to practical shoes and excellent tote bags.
Here, the author of No One You Know shares the objects that quietly power her days—from middle school librarian life to motherhood to the kind of literary nostalgia that leaves permanent marks (sometimes literally).
01. The Forever Sneaker
Black Converse Chuck Taylor High Tops
Emma has been wearing these since middle school, which means the relationship is approaching what in literary terms we might call a “long-form narrative arc.” The only downside: breaking in a new pair. Anyone who has ever limped through that first week knows it’s less “coming-of-age story” and more Greek tragedy.
02. The Hoop Era (Still Going Strong)
Extra-Large Gold Hoop Earrings
Another middle-school habit that stuck: oversized gold hoops. Emma wisely buys the inexpensive versions from H&M or Old Navy, because eventually one always vanishes into the same mysterious dimension where socks and Tupperware lids go.
03. The Kitchen Uniform
Hedley & Bennett Pinafore Apron
Some people “throw something together” in the kitchen. Emma gears up like a professional. The apron goes on immediately—even if the task is simply washing dishes—because life is better when your domestic routines come with a little flair.
04. The Legendary Coffee Bazooka
20 oz Klean Kanteen Insulated Mug
Filled at 6 a.m., still warm at noon. This heroic thermos accompanies Emma through her half-hour commute and the first hours of the school day. Her husband calls it The Bazooka, which feels accurate. The tragic twist? The model has been discontinued. A literary loss of Dickensian proportions.
05. The Literary Souvenir Strategy
Blackwell’s of Oxford Canvas Tote
Emma and her husband have a travel ritual: first find a good coffee shop, then find a bookstore. She skips the trinkets and magnets in favor of the superior souvenir—a bookstore tote. Her favorite comes from Blackwell’s in Oxford, where her parents and one of her sisters live.
06. The Family Nerd Olympics
NYT Games App (Wordle & Connections)
Emma shares a WhatsApp thread with her husband and two sisters dedicated entirely to Wordle and Connections scores. Yes, it’s nerdy. Yes, it’s competitive. And yes, it’s apparently hilarious.
07. The Book That Never Leaves You
Charlotte’s Web by E. B. White
Emma’s childhood copy of Charlotte’s Web remains her favorite book in the world—then, now, and always. It left such a mark that the only tattoo she has is drawn from its pages:
“This lovely world, these precious days.”
Which, if you think about it, may be the most perfect motto for midlife there is.
Where readers can find you:
https://www.instagram.com/emmatourtelot
Now, dearest Readers, we’ve got the next chapter of Just Like a Movie by . We’re doing this because it’s so critical that our readers have access to respite, momentary, and laughter—so that they refuel.
This week the art department surprised us with a new cover treatment. What do you think? Tell us in the comments. We’re still mulling it all over…
And some additional options from our art department!
Chapter Ten
I envy Laura. She’s so serene, so calm and in control despite having just lived through the cheating husband experience. I wish some of her positive traits would rub off on me, because I really am a bit of a mess. In fact, I’m beginning to wonder whether therapy might be a good idea, but the thought of spewing out my pathetic inner life to a complete stranger doesn’t appeal. I feel silly-mad, not crazy-mad.
While I muse miserably, Laura and Celeste forget all about me and my problems and get carried away discussing the merits of red onions over regular onions, then move on to debating whether organic lentils take longer to prepare than plain lentils. How fucking fascinating. I hover in familiar lettuce, carrot and tomato territory, feeling sorry for myself.
Laura drives us home, helps unload the car, and then decides to stay for our traditional summer holiday initiation ceremony, a ritual instigated by Celeste when she first moved here. It’s basically a big name for a glass of Spanish champagne and a handful of crisps and peanuts. We’ve spent many an evening like this, just the three of us, sprawled on the outdoor couch, listening to New Age music by candlelight and having profound conversations about relationships that we will vaguely recall the following morning.
“How’s Gianni?” Celeste asks Laura through a mouthful of peanuts. “What’s happening with him?”
“Who cares!” Laura huffs, knocking back another glass of champagne. “Quel con! But I am over him now. It was hard for a while, you know, but I am happier without him. Always he tries to control me, to tell me do this, do that, don’t do this, why you do it that way, you should do it this way, and then he does and does that big connerie with that grosse salope. But you know, I got my little revenge. Hé hé! Did I tell you what I did to Gianni? Oh, mon Dieu! I wish I could have seen his face when he saw what I did to the apartment.”
Celeste giggles. “What did you do? Ooh, the redecorating you talked about! Tell us!”
Laura’s marriage to Gianni, a well-known Italian architect with whom she ran an interior decorating business, fell apart nine months ago when she discovered he was having an affair with his hairdresser. Laura laughs, tucks her elegant legs underneath her, and tosses her glossy brown hair. “Oh, it was a production majeure,” she says, her eyes shining. “I planned for many months. I wanted to make it perfect. It cost me une fortune, you know, but I’m so happy I did it. He will never forget this!”
Maybe I should be taking notes.
“You remember our apartment in Rome?”
Gianni and Laura’s apartment in Rome was a large, luxurious old palazzo in a courtyard leading onto the ultra-chic Via Condotti. Her shop on the corner was Prada. Her shop on the other corner was Gucci. Across the road was Chanel. Her wardrobe was a mix of all three. Richard and I once went to stay with them for an extended weekend and I remember their interior as paired down and ultra-Zen. She favoured minimalist floral arrangements, a single lily in a black cylindrical vase. Everything was grey and white, angular, sophisticated.
“Yes, of course, it was beautiful.” I shoo away a large, hairy, flying beetle.
“Alors, I redecorated it for him in a different style.” She’s grinning so much her ears must be tickling. “While my lovely ‘usband is away on a business trip, I have the entire house relooké as we say in French. Oh, it was so much fun! It was so disgusting when I finished! It was fantastique! You know the beautiful antique parquet floor in the living room? Well, I cover it with the most ugly carpet you ‘ave ever seen in all your life. It gives you, how do you say, le mal de mer? Oh, yes – it gives you seasickness when you look at it.”
She’s fantastic! “What was it like?”
“It was the colour of duck caca mixed with a sort of ‘orrible burnt orange. “With big…” – she demonstrates with arm movements – “big swirly patterns on it. I love it! So perfect! And then, in the bedrooms I put a dusty pink, longhaired, really terrible carpet. You know the kind where you see the long, shiny nylon threads? My God, it was so ‘orrible! I loved it!” She’s almost crying with laughter now.
“You devil!” I exclaim.
“Wait, c’est pas fini,” she says, wiping her eyes and smudging her mascara. “Let me tell you everything else. I took out all the old bathrooms…”
“You didn’t!” gasps Celeste, her mouth falling open in horror. “Not those beautiful old bathroom fittings?”
“Oui, ma chérie. I did it. I took them out and I sold them for beaucoup d’argent. I made so much money. And then, I put in cheap ones in a special orange colour. How can I describe it? Let me see, they were, you know, like those rouleaux distributeurs de Scotch orange?”
“Sellotape distributor orange,” I translate.
“Yes, merci chérie. Yes, and the bath I did in the brown of an upset stomach. The effect was incroyable! And then, the best! The most fun. I went shopping for furniture.” Laura waves her glass at Celeste, asking for a refill. Celeste, all ears, tops her up.
“What about the furniture?” I ask.
Laura lights a cigarette. “Some I keep, some I sell,” she says breezily, exhaling a toxic translucent blue mist. “But for Gianni, only catalogue best would do. I bought a ‘orrible, black, faux leather couch with gold patches on it. It was so kitsch. And wait, the bed, fantastique! Enorme and edged with zebra artificial fur. With a built-in radio, bien sûr! Nice sheets too for Gianni and his big salope. Black and white polyester zebra print. Shiny ones making much static electricity.”
Poor Gianni (well, not really). Laura didn’t overlook a single detail of his new decor, from the black velvet Day-Glo posters on the walls, to the dull brown, transparent, unbreakable dinner service displayed on the shiny white melamine dresser she put in the kitchen. For the ledge above the fireplace — which, naturally, she edged with synthetic white lace — she found an ultra-kitsch gold clock featuring a twirling, pink-tutued ballerina and surrounded it with a collection of frolicking, pink and turquoise porcelain horses. Then, the transformation complete, she packed her Louis Vuitton suitcases and moved into a large apartment overlooking the river Tiber where she had had the best of her understated furniture relocated, leaving Gianni a note wrapped around the stalk of a single white lily.
Gianni was not amused. The divorce papers soon arrived.
“And that’s when I make the decision to start my own business. You know, I realised I don’t need Gianni at all. Always we argue about what the clients are really wanting. It’s easier now. He was impossible. Such a diva.” She tosses her hair, rolls her eyes, remembering. Then she sits back, takes a drag on her cigarette, stretches her arms towards the sky and blows smoke into the golden late afternoon light. “Wow, what a wonderful sky. Maybe I should come and live here in Ibiza with you, les filles. We could all work together. It would be fantastique.”
“I’d love that,” exclaims Celeste.
“Me too!”
Now that I’ve heard what Laura did, I’m thinking how fun it would have been to do something crazy to the apartment in Geneva before I left. I could have turned it into a shrine dedicated to the glory of popstars. Richard would have had such a shock when he came home for a night of rumpy-pumpy with his Meanie only to find the walls papered with teenybopper posters. I could have covered the coffee table with biographies of pop idols and boy bands, displayed a collection of popstar Barbies on the bookcase and hung a portrait of Emilio Caliente above the fireplace.
Laura is in the middle of telling us about the monthly, lifetime subscription she has set up for Gianni with an English manufacturer of porcelain plates decorated with twee, gaudy pussycats when my phone rings.
It’s Richard. He’s just calling to see how I am. What’s with this annoying masculine trait? They dump you and then call you every so often to see how you are. They don’t want you back. They’re just suddenly jolted by an unexpected, unfamiliar emotion with which we women are all too familiar: guilt. And in this particular instance, I’d say Richard’s guilt is tinged with a good dose of curiosity over the Emilio mobile phone mix-up.
Well, how am I? How shall I describe it to him?
I lie back on the couch and inhale a lungful of balmy air. “I’m great. Everything is wonderful. I’m sitting here with Laura and Celeste, drinking champagne, discussing plans for tonight. You know how it is here: fun-fun-fun!”
I can tell from Richard’s tone that he is bursting with questions about my alleged night with Emilio but can’t muster up the courage to ask. Ha! I hang up with a curt “ciao”. Through a champagne enhanced blur, I picture his face should he see me in the tabloids, wrapped around Emilio Caliente. It would put me up there in the league of Laura’s furniture onslaught, but way more my style.
While Laura takes off over the hill to shower in hot water and change – presumably into white palazzo pants and a black T-shirt – Celeste and I decide to have a nap with our faces slathered in moisturising masks. As I drift off into an enjoyable and rather osé dream about you-know-who, Celeste tries to call Sebastien to enquire about the position of his bank account, having depleted her own with a sudden, irrepressible need for new clothes. She’s decided her car has finally been defeated by Ibizinco caminos and that she needs a new one.
I wake up two hours later with an intricate pillow pattern on my face that will take ages to disappear. My hair lies flat against my skull in limp, moist, matted clumps. I drag myself up and discover Celeste trying to do arithmetic. We both failed maths at school, so I dread to think of the results she’s coming up with. She’s probably adding where she should be subtracting and will be under the impression that money was transferred miraculously overnight from the almond trees surrounding her house. A brand new, multi-turboed SUV disaster will ensue.
“How’s it going?” I ask, trying to rub the creases off my face. She sighs, spreading out numerous sheets of paper.
“I don’t know. I couldn’t reach Sebastien. These all relate to my account, but I can’t figure anything out. Looks like there is enough money, but then there are all these damn business transactions mixed up with mortgage repayments and household bills. I feel like a blonde with a bubble.”
“You are a blonde with a bubble. I should be blonde too, considering the number of bubbles in my head. Maybe I should become a blonde and stop trying to fool the entire world. Here, let me see.”
I start leafing through the papers. However, ‘important paperwork’ and I don’t mesh. My mind says, ‘Bloody hell, what are you asking me to do? There’s no way I can do this!’, and so my eyes just peer blindly at the red squiggles and the black squiggles and the information doesn’t go any further. It’s as though there’s a malfunction with the nerve endings in my eyes. They don’t connect to the black and red squiggles, so the squiggles just sit there, cartoon-like, in my pupils.
“Don’t you have a Visa card?” I ask, blonde to the max.
“Do you think I can buy a car with a Visa card?”
“I think it depends on the type of Visa card.”
“I don’t think I’ve got the kind of Visa card that car salesmen accept.”
“Oh.”
“Do you?”
“I don’t know.”
“What colour is it?”
“Platinum.”
“I think that’s the good kind.”
“Okay, cool!”
I picture myself calling Richard. “Hey Rich, I just bought a new black Mercedes jeep with leather interior, sunroof, supercalifragilistic stereo and air-conditioning.” Well, he was the one who said I was an airhead, floating through fluffy pink clouds on a magic carpet. I think I deserve to float in style. I have a new project for tomorrow. Suddenly, my future’s so bright I’ve got to have tinted windows, too!
Only Ten Days Until…
Another Publishers Weekly Pick by Empress Editions!
And on 4/21, one of our funniest, most tender books of the year by arrives! Get yours now!
Then, what if menopause made you MAGICAL instead of miserable?
Publishers Weekly calls The Department of Dark Errands a “ferocious, emotionally grounded debut.”
Coming 4/28, it’s the Harry Potter for midlife women, we've ALL been waiting for!
And who could forget our gorgeous Empress whose launch of Who By Fire just three weeks ago with (author of Unfixed) was PACKED with so much joy and fierce literary kinship.
Stay safe out there! Yours in Grandeur & Deep Sh*t,
👑 About Empress Editions
Empress Editions is an independent publishing house amplifying the voices, vision, and vitality of midlife women—the most powerful untapped movement in publishing.
Founded by Alisa Kennedy Jones and Heather Bartos, with distribution by Hachette, Empress champions bold storytelling across four imprints — Voices, Vices, Virtues, and Visionaries — spanning memoir, romantasy, literary fiction, and thought leadership.
Our mission? To turn midlife wisdom into cultural capital.
Our method? Pair timeless books with next-generation technology to create immersive, intelligent, deeply human reading experiences.
Read real books. Touch real paper.
Find yourself again in the pages.
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