E.E. Hussey is a Philippine-born writer and professor whose work has appeared in The Kenyon Review, PANK, and elsewhere. She has received support from Goodyear Arts, the Vermont Studio Center, the Virginia G. Piper Center, Tin House, and the Bread Loaf Environmental Writers’ Conference. Currently, she lives in North Carolina.
Hussey’s debut novel, Hafa Adai, explores sisterhood, identity, and death. It will be published by Curbstone Books/Northwestern University Press on January 15, 2027, and is available for pre-order now.
Debutiful is honored to reveal the cover of Hafa Adai, designed by Morgan Krehbiel, along with a Q&A with Hussey about its creation.
While writing the book, did you have any ideas for what you wanted the cover to look like?
No. Writing and publishing are different animals. While writing, I’m not thinking about the cover or publication. What I am doing is fighting the impulse to spend months in research or feeding some fixation in revision or procrastinating through typewriter paper searches, or reading. I did think a lot about the title (more on that later).
Can you explain what the design process was like once you started working with your publishing team?
My editor sent an author questionnaire which asked me to share my initial thoughts on the cover. I included a handful of covers I admired for their minimalism (The Emissary by Yoko Tawada was a favorite), a few photographs from Saipan and Tinian (where much of the book takes place), and a “pleaseno” file. I was initially nervous to be explicit about the styles I didn’t like, but my editor claimed it was so helpful that she was going to make it a requirement for all of her authors going forward.
Luckily, the designer knocked it out of the park in the first round. Both options were fabulous. I spoke with my agent after we received them—mostly praise and about how happy we were. Then we sent back a few minor notes on the positioning of the starling’s head and the SPAM can. The designer took our feedback to heart and sent back this final version. It felt absolutely right to me. It’s a great position to be in when you have people you trust who understand the book and what’s best for it.
What was it like seeing your finalized cover for the first time?
I used to joke that good book news was cursed. Hafa Adai is a book about grief (and death) and over the course of its life, it suffered many background deaths and strange little griefs. Any time something good happened for the book (I got an offer, or signed my contract, or finished revisions with my editor) it was flanked by something not as fabulous, like a death, or a political horror, or health issues. But (thankfully) nothing terrible took place around the cover finalization. I’ve decided this means the curse is broken.
So, when I got the final cover, I performed a wellness check on my dogs and cats. Then celebrated, with cake and coffee at a local shop.
Beyond that, I was deeply grateful to everyone who supported Hafa Adai. Everyone at the press. The designer. My editors. My agent. And Kelly Link pulled off magic, writing the blurb to make the front cover deadline—such an incredible kindness and generosity.
All of these things came together in the end, and I am left with gratitude when I see the cover. It’s a beautiful reminder of how many hands are at work to usher a book into existence. And I only want to work harder because of that feeling.
How does the cover work to convey what the book is all about?
Hafa Adai is about two half-sisters navigating a strange world to find each other after one disappears during military practice bombing. The book is punctuated by Filipino folklore; a ghost with an omikuji tongue that has a penchant for stealing people’s memories; and a curious Micronesian starling.
I was delighted to see the starling on the cover and even more so, the SPAM can.
Like many former US colonies or areas of the world rubbing against the US military, the Philippines (and the CNMI, Hawaii, Guam, etc.) took to SPAM during and after WWII. It’s shelf stable. It’s pre-cooked. Culturally, it traveled well. This isn’t an advertisement or endorsement of potted meats. It’s just a fascinating emblem for that kind of cultural friction.
In the book, the aforementioned ghost is stuck in a SPAM can as he accompanies one of the sisters, Ligaya, on her search. The Micronesian starling is a more movable creature—the starling is tied to the other sister, Amihan, as she seeks to escape a plane that intersects between the dead, the living, and the folkloric. All of this is disrupted by the US military’s practice bombing, so the inclusion of the SPAM can also speaks to the cultural consequences and conversations born alongside boundaries and borders.
What does the title mean?
“Hafa adai” (pronounced “hah-fa-day” / “hah-fuh ah-day”) is a beautiful, welcoming CHamoru/Chamorro greeting of hello. CHamoru/Chamorro is an Austronesian language of Guam and the Mariana Islands, including the island of Tinian.
I heard “hafa adai” spoken when I was a child, but in 2015 I volunteered with an avian conversation group in the CNMI and made initial notes (observations and questions) that I found curious or interesting. Years later, in writing the book, I was considering the experience of being mixed race and the feeling of searching for intersections of community, history, and identity. Being Asian. Being Asian American. Being Filipino. Being Filipino American. Being mixed race. It felt important for the sisters to find a bridge that wasn’t inherently or obviously shared.
I kept coming back to the phrase as I thought about these two half-sisters and their desire to understand each other. One sister is Filipino American and the other is Filipino Japanese—they share their Filipino heritage but do not share an American nationality. While writing this book, I was thinking about people who live between nationalities. Between cultures. Between environments. Between folkloric traditions. All alongside the ramifications of the US military on identity, environment, and living things.
There is no monolith of experience. Not even for siblings. For the sisters, Tinian is the bridge in their shared experiences. Neither speak CHamoru/Chamorro. Other than English, neither share languages they were born into. And in thinking of the Filipino diaspora, I was considering the way language doesn’t always move between generations and wondering what happens to those who live between the consequences of human movement. What is it like to exist between myth, death, culture, mixed family, environment, and histories of military violence?
So the title speaks to the sisters and their pursuit of each other through very real global forces. But the book is also about the beauty of connection. The cover design—the Micronesian starling and the SPAM can—and the title complement that beauty.