Love At First Fright by Nadia El-Fassi: Ghosts, Glamour, and a Very Steamy Romance

Rosemary Shaw, a bestselling horror novelist who’s been seeing ghosts since childhood, travels to Hallowvale Manor in the English countryside when her book is adapted for film. The production brings Hollywood action star Ellis Finch-an on-screen Victorian gentleman and off-screen enigma-into the manor’s orbit. Between creaking corridors, the manor’s restless spirits, and the pressure of a film shoot, Rosemary tries to hide both her clairvoyance and the fact that Ellis unnerves and excites her. As paranormal flickers and production headaches bubble around them, the two are pulled into a charged, BDSM-leaning relationship that quickly becomes the novel’s main focus.

My Review

I picked this up for the ghost-story vibe and left the manor slightly more distracted by the chemistry than the apparitions. Author Nadia El-Fassi writes heat that hits hard-Ellis and Rosemary spark in a way that made me turn pages faster-and the BDSM dynamics are rendered with clear intent and sensual detail. The film-set setting and Hallowvale’s atmosphere contributed nice texture early on: foggy hedgerows, late-night runs of the camera, and the claustrophobic glamour of actors living on set.

What readers should expect is important: if you come for a meaty paranormal mystery, this leans light on ghostly explanation and heavy on erotic tension. The novel juggles a haunted manor, movie production, a lead actor with hidden desires-but ultimately centers on the lovers’ sexual and emotional entanglement rather than solving the manor’s supernatural riddles. I enjoyed the way Rosemary’s clairvoyance colored quieter moments and Ellis’s vulnerability offset his star swagger, but the tonal shift from spooky to sweaty felt abrupt at times. So if you love atmospheric settings and don’t mind a romance that prioritizes kink and intimacy over spectral thrills, you’ll find a lot to savor here.

You can get a copy of Love At First Fright by Nadia El-Fassi on Amazon or Bookshop.

If this has you intrigued, read an excerpt from Love At First Fright below.

Excerpt Preview

“I’ll tell you what,” Immy persisted, “watch this clip—I’m gonna share it in the chat—and if you honestly tell me you don’t think he’s hot, then I’ll shut my mouth and this is the last you’ll hear from me about it. Deal?”

“Deal,” Rosemary replied. How hard could this be?

Her phone beeped, and a moment later she had the video loaded on her screen, sharing it between the three of them. Even with their faces tiny in the corner of the screen, she still
felt the joy you can only get from friends, seeping into her limbs, bubbling happily inside her.

“Ooh, I’ve seen this clip already,” Dina squeaked, and Scott popped his head into the call and waved hello. “Is this the video where he kisses the living daylights out of that dairymaid?” He
chuckled.

“The very one.” Dina smiled, pressing a kiss to his temple before Scott ducked out of view again.

“You two make me all soppy.” Immy yawned.

Rosemary rolled her eyes, and pressed Play.

This clip was from that one period drama he’d been in, made a few years ago by the looks of it. Rosemary had never watched it, too scared to hate how he portrayed the character. The clip had been shared online millions of times, titled “Ellis Finch Best Movie Kisses Part 1.”

“How many parts are there?” Rosemary asked, worried.

“At least ten.” Immy grinned.

The clip was cut in such a way so that most of the dialogue was cut out.

It began with Ellis Finch, complete with button-down billowing shirt that hinted at the packed muscle and dark hair beneath, striding boldly across a sunlit meadow. Wrapping a firm, tanned arm around the heroine’s waist, he drags her close. Rosemary thought he would kiss her immediately, but that would clearly be too rudimentary for Ellis Finch, or rather, his
character. Instead, he tucks a loose curl behind her ear, his thumb caressing her eyebrow, her cheek, her lips, before his hand strokes down to her neck and finally—finally—he kisses her. Kisses her like he is a man starved of all touch; like this is the final kiss before an execution (she hadn’t seen the film, so perhaps that was the case); like he’d never known love until he
held her.

Heat shot through Rosemary and settled deep in her belly as she watched the clip, transfixed. She was acutely aware of every minute movement of the kiss, of Ellis’s rough grip around
the dairymaid’s throat—not aggressive, but carnal in a way that was possessive yet gentle. It made her shiver. For a split second she allowed herself to imagine what it might be like to be on the receiving end of a kiss like that. To have those hands pressed gently around her throat. To be faced with so much . . . need.

Excerpted from Love At First Fright by Nadia El-Fassi. Copyright © 2025 by Nadia El-Fassi. Reprinted by permission of Dell. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.

Ready for More?

If a moody manor and a dangerously magnetic leading man sound like your kind of night in, grab your copy of Love At First Fright. When you’ve read it, come back and tell me in the comments-did you want more ghost story, or was the romance exactly what you were hoping for?

You can get a copy of Love At First Fright by Nadia El-Fassi on Amazon or Bookshop.