By Lena Zeller
Imagine yourself walking into a cafe, the cold seeping from your limbs, the air smelling like treats that will not just revive you, but grant you just a little bit more luck. And perhaps you will run into the love of your life…
Best Hex Ever comes as close to real magic as it gets, second only to being tolerated by a really grumpy cat. It transports you into a hidden, magical corner of London filled with love, warmth and a journey towards self-acceptance. Perfect not just for romance lovers, but for anyone looking to escape into a cosier, yet spooky reality.
I had the pleasure of interviewing the wonderful Nadia El-Fassi, a Royal Holloway alumnus of the Creative Writing Poetry master’s program. Her recent debut novel Best Hex Ever is the ideal book to curl up in the library with in the colder months.
Q: Would you introduce yourself to our readers?
A: I’m Nadia El-Fassi, author of Best Hex Ever, a cosy, contemporary, fantasy romance novel that was published this October by Del Rey Books. I’m also a Commissioning Editor at Orbit Books, a sci-fi, fantasy and horror imprint, and I graduated from the Creative Writing Poetry MA with a distinction in 2018.
Q: As an alumnus, what did you take away from your time here at Royal Holloway, both from your course and in general? Any advice for current students?
A: Studying poetry, I learnt so much about the weight of specific words and syntax, something that I’ve hopefully carried through into my prose, though I’m writing in a very different space now. The breadth of my literary knowledge was blown wide, my professors introducing me to many new authors that I still read and love. The need to write and produce creatively each week for workshops also helped me to be less precious with my first drafts, and to be calm and open to criticism.
As for advice, I would say to read as widely as you can. Say you want to write horror: don’t just read horror. Read sci-fi, lit fic, romance, poetry, history, popular science. Some of the things that have inspired me the most in my writing have come from the strangest of places, don’t limit yourself or turn your nose down on any genre – as I know Literature students can be known to do. All writing has merit.
Q: What inspired your shift from poetry to romance novels? Does your poetry education still influence your writing?
A: Throughout my undergrad and postgrad, I read romance on the sly. It has always been my guilty pleasure, until I left higher education and realised that I didn’t need to feel so guilty about it anymore. Working as an editor in publishing, I realised I wanted to write and publish prose, so that became my focus. I still occasionally drift into writing poems, and it’s certainly formed the way I write my prose, but writing a novel a year on deadline can mean I have little time for much more additional literary experimentation.
Q: What magical things do readers have to look forward to in Best Hex Ever?
A: Best Hex Ever is a romance between a kitchen witch café owner and a museum curator, and it features baking magic inspired by my Moroccan heritage, a sentient house, a spooky old manor, ghosts, magical animal familiars and one very pesky hex.
Q: I really loved the queer storyline at the centre of the book, and how you depicted all kinds of love, especially the mother-daughter relationship. Without spoiling anything, can you talk a bit about what inspired that?
A: Thank you! It was really important to me to have a bisexual main character whose queerness isn’t negated because they end up in a “straight” relationship. I was also inspired by my Moroccan heritage, and truthfully, I wanted to write a character who reminded me of my Mum, who passed away when I was nineteen – Dina’s mother Nour is based on her in some ways.
Q: As a writer myself, I have to ask what your writing process is like and if your experience as an editor has influenced it.
A: It definitely has! I’m a plotter, and I follow the rough rules of the romance genre which allows for more structure, but when it comes down to scene specifics, those change as I go along and the characters come to life. I think being an editor in some ways allows me to think about traits of the genre that I love and want to include, but in many ways I rely on my own agent and editors or their advice and criticism as it can be difficult to view your own work with objectivity.
Q: If we treat Best Hex Ever like one of Dina’s teas or pastries, what magical ingredients went into it?
A: My own love for baking certainly, as well as for ‘witchy’ media like Practical Magic and Charmed. I was also inspired by Talia Hibbert’s romance novels, and my favourite tropes I peppered in are forced proximity, found family and meddlesome animal familiars.
Q: What are the tea leaves saying about your next project?
A: My second novel is set in the same world as Best Hex Ever, but is a standalone ghost filled paranormal romance called Love at First Fright, and it’s publishing in October 2025.
Q: What treat and drink are you getting from Serendipity Café, and what spells would you like to be cast on them?
A: I’d have to order an autumnal maple latte because I require coffee to put words on the page, as well as a rose and almond ghriba, a Moroccan cookie, and they would be bespelled with the contented feeling you get when your cat kneads biscuits on you.
Q: Charms of protection are important to both Dina and Scott; do you have something that brings you luck? Also, because I loved Heebie, would your cat make a good familiar?
A: Like Dina, I make sure to have a hamsa, or evil eye on me at all times as my own personal amulet! And my cat Fitz would be a great familiar, he’s very talkative and loves sitting beside me as I write: the perfect author’s pet.
Nadia is such an inspiration to me and I hope you find something that inspires you in this interview or in the pages of her book. Best Hex Ever is available everywhere you can acquire books, and I highly recommend you pick up a copy!
Photo Credit: Ella Kemp