Twisted Love by Ana Huang

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Getting back to planned tbr, I needed to finally get to Twisted Love by Ana Huang. This is the first in her Twisted series. The second book, Twisted Games, just came out last month and is the pick for the Ravished by Romance book club this month. I have both in paperback and thought this was a good excuse to finally read them! Update: I applied this to the prompt of cover buy for tbr for the 3rd board of Summer of Swoon.

Ava lives next door to her brother and they are super close. He is going to medical school and joined a volunteer program to go to Central America for a year to provide medical assistance. He is overly worried about Ava and asks his best friend Alex to live in his house and look over Ava. She is finishing her degree, but really wants to be a photographer. While she's not necessarily a trouble magnet like Alex and her brother Josh make her out to be, she is a very optimistic and sunshiney person that strives to see the best in those around her.

I was really intrigued by this book and ended up buying it when it released earlier this year. I usually don't buy paperbacks before I read a book (outside of historicals), but the author was posting quotes and excerpts on her instagram and I was super intrigued. Also, since she is an Asian and indie author, I wanted to show my support. This is 100% a I don't like anyone but you (and her brother). I really enjoyed Alex and Ava and how drawn they were to each other. The steam was okay, except for one thing that I'll talk about later, and I enjoyed how they both pushed each other towards more of a gray and middle viewpoint of the world. This is a great grumpy-sunshine trope, so if you are into that certainly check it out.

I have this marked as dark romance, and while I didn't necessary feel dark to me, I can see how it would be to others. If you are interested in trying dark romance but don't want to go too deep, this would be a good option. Alex also has a little bit of mafia vibes, but he's not mafia. Just a very powerful, genius, CEO. Now there were a couple things I didn't enjoy. One was part of his kink. It's known that he's very specific in intimate relations with others, from behind, no face-to-face, no kissing and he like's choking and "dirty talk." While the kinks are fan, I did not like the dirty talk portion. It was really dirty talk so much as him calling her whore. That is not my kink, so it did bother me, but Ava was into it. What I didn't like about it was that it was made clear the first time they sleep together that Ava is different. He flips her over and kisses her as they finish. I just wish that there was an intimate scene between them where he didn't call her that. I just wish he changed it up or there was one scene were it was more soft and slow between them. It doesn't need to be the same every single time, especially since it was more of the connection between them at that point.

The other part I didn't enjoy was the end and how long they were separated. I understood Ava stepping back after Alex hurt her, but I feel like she should've also realized why he said the things he did earlier. I didn't like that they spent a year plus apart, although some of it was strictly in a friendly platonic way. While I liked her kind of becoming her own person and stepping up for herself, it felt a little drawn out. I just wanted more for the reconciliation and for Ava to also realize and come to terms with why he said the things he did. My heart broken for Alex and his struggle with feeling not good enough for Ava.

I really enjoyed Twisted Love and am intrigued by the future books in the series. I'm guessing that we'll get books for her three friends and know that book two is about Bridget, the princess, and her new bodyguard. We also see that Jules and her brother Josh don't get along in this book, which kind of leads up to the announcement that they are book 3. I'm a little disappointed though because I would like for Josh to be paired up with Stella. That would be more of opposites attract and appeals to me more at this point. That could change after I read Twisted Games though. We'll see.

Have you read Twisted Love?

Bookishly Yours,

Stasi🍎

STATISTICS: Twisted Love, Ana Huang, 4-stars, 1 day, paperback, 358 pages, published in 2021