BOOKS. MAGIC. ROMANCE. Neena Noon’s To Vex & To Hex is the perfect spicy witchy romance to have you hexed this spooky season!
Intrigued? Read on to discover the synopsis and an excerpt from To Vex & To Hex by Neena Noon, which releases on November 3rd 2026.
Lucy Ansari has a magical life. Literally ― she’s a witch, managing a perfect little bookshop. And whenever she’s a little lonely, she turns to Charles ― her beloved, ageing boss ― to keep her company.
Disaster strikes when Charles breaks his hip: his prickly (and gorgeous) grandson Grayson arrives. The English professor from Dublin has never bothered to visit before, but now he’s determined to look after Charles and his bookshop, and Lucy’s ideal life is thrown into disarray.
But Grayson is as stubborn as he is handsome, and he’s set on winning Lucy over, one way or another. As sparks fly between them, Lucy and Grayson may find themselves spellbound by more than just magic…
EXCERPT
From To Vex & To Hex by Neena Noon © 2026 by the author and reprinted by permission of St. Martin’s Publishing Group.
Chapter 1
Lucy Ansari was in a terrible mood.
She did not look up to the sky to appreciate the clouds as she made her way into her car, nor did she take time to enjoy the sweet scent of baked goods wafting from the back seat. She did not fiddle with the radio, nor did she open her window to catch a breath of fresh morning air.
When she arrived on Main Street in the town of Little Brook, she only smiled politely at her neighbors; she did not ask them how they were getting on, for her mood was too foul. On any other morning, she might admire the colorful buildings, painted blue or yellow or pink.
She loved this small town, the streets jutting off Main Street, whimsically named drives like Storybook Court and Blueberry Lane. Especially, she loved it this time of the year: early November, when every storefront—not only hers—was decorated with lights or wreaths or maybe even holly, but today she could not enjoy that, either.
What else could be expected of her? It was ten in the morning, and she’d been up for hours, baking and collecting flowers from her garden for the shop. She was now in front of Crawley Books, and the door was locked of all things, a horrible, physical reminder of everything that was wrong.
She had a key, of course; she’d been working there as a manager ever since she’d graduated from college two years ago, but she’d never had cause to use it until now. The owner, Charles Crawley, had always beaten her to it.
Each morning, she would enter with her arms full of her purse, her water bottle, the baked goods, flowers, a sweater, an extra pair of socks, her lip balm, a clip, and anything else she might need, and he would always be inside, white hair neatly combed to the side, large glasses sitting on his nose. He’d already be sipping away at a cup of tea, reading a book or watering his plants, waiting for her.
“Lucy-Lu,let me help you with that,” he would say. He loved to call her Lucy-Lu, and she loved it when he did. “It’s a wonder you manage to carry all that.”
To which she would grin. At the same time, they would both say, “Magic.”
She was a witch, after all, a fact he knew well, since he was, too.
But magic couldn’t save an eighty-year-old man from slipping down the stairs and breaking his hip, so Charles had been in the hospital for the past two days, recovering from surgery.
This was her third morning without him.
The store felt empty, like a fireplace with no fire. With a sigh, Lucy carried on. The store would be opening soon, and she needed to get everything sorted before then.
With a snap of her fingers, the lights switched on, and the many fairy lights draped across the window display and shelves plugged themselves in (it took forever to do it by hand). Being a witch openly could court danger—people were always so quick to act in hatred against anyone who might be different—but because no one was around, she could use her magic freely and without worry.
With another snap, a duster began dancing across the tops of the bookshelves, brushing away the thin layer of dust settled on the wooden fixtures as she set to making her breakfast in the café section of the store.
As the espresso machine whirred to life, she pulled out one of her favorite mugs, which was shaped to resemble a knitted sock. Lucy stuck a thick slice of bread in the toaster, then made herself a brown sugar latte, inhaling the sharp smells of espresso and vanilla and sighing.
When the toast popped out with a ding, she slathered the golden bread with French butter, relishing the shining pools of melted goodness that settled into her almost-burned toast.
Between sips of her sweet coffee and bites of her delicious toast, Lucy unpacked the boxes of baked goods she’d brought in, arranging them handsomely in the display case. Everything was warm and fresh: the cardamom buns, the butter pecan chocolate chip cookies, the pumpkin scones, the ramekins of apple crumble she would reheat and top with ice cream before serving.
Lucy reached for a pumpkin scone, but her hand froze midway. It didn’t feel right to sneak an early morning treat without Charles there to share it with her. His sweet tooth was worse than hers, and she loved seeing him savor her treats, the way he’d close his eyes in bliss, the wrinkles on his face shifting with enjoyment as he smiled.
The fact that he wasn’t here made her frown, and so she slid the display door shut with a snap, hand empty.
Unease rippled through her as she thought of Charles alone in the hospital. It reminded her of the terrifying moment when Charles had called three days earlier to inform her not only that he was in the hospital, but that he had slipped and fallen down the stairs in his home. An ambulance had brought him to the hospital soon after, and he’d had hip surgery.
So much had happened, and she hadn’t even known until it was all over. When Lucy had arrived at the hospital, the first thing she did after seeing Charles was ask the receptionist why she hadn’t been called as soon as he’d been admitted.
“What’s your name?” the receptionist had asked, looking at her computer.
“Lucy Ansari,” Lucy had replied.
“I don’t see your name here,” the receptionist had said. “Looks like his emergency contact is Grayson Crawley.”
Her vision had gone red. Charles’s useless, absent grandson—a man who couldn’t even be bothered to show up to his own grandmother’s funeral—had no business being Charles’s emergency contact.
From To Vex & To Hex by Neena Noon © 2026 by the author and reprinted by permission of St. Martin’s Publishing Group.
