A review by smuttymcbookface
Twisted Love by Ana Huang

challenging dark fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.75

When you read a book, even the most fantastical, you often try to believe that there could be a way that reality existed. You try to reason that if X did come into power, or if magic was available, then maybe this really could have happened.

Twisted Love, despite being a contemporary, is completely beyond belief.

The characters in this were caricatures of what they should have been.

Alex, aka darkness, was a joke. His two thought paths were "sex" and "vengeance". If someone crosses him, he literally destroys their life (ex boyfriend assaults Ava, *destroyed*, ex girlfriend mentions Ava to uncle, *destroyed*, other man looks at Ava, "do it again and you're *destroyed*). For someone who shows no emotion, he's so trigger-finger happy. Then when
Ava moves on, and away to London, he openly stalks her for a year to change her mind, before (have eye bleach ready) publically singing to her at her final photography exhibit, where there were no other entertainment sources, which everyone apparently loved and Ava was so moved by that she finally accepts him back.
I struggle to think of a more awful scene.

On the other side Ava, aka sunshine, bakes cookies and always hopes for the best in people. She repressed dark memories from her childhood, and is so sweet and innocent and desperate to be corrupted (who could possibly help her out?). She typically forgives and forgets, and although I am very happy that there had to be some sort of grovel at the end, the fact that
she would have been happy to forgive and forget after what happened in the kidnapping was just too much


This story tried to be the embodiment of Sunshine X Grumpy, where he literally calls her Sunshine and thinks about her lighting up his darkness. Which is completely fine. But the writing was so completely on the nose that it was just too much.

The Good:
  • Sex scenes were well-written
  • The diversity of backgrounds of the main characters, as well as the future main characters, is great
  • There were some funny parts
  • The plot was interesting, and would have been great had it not been so contrived

The Bad:
  • Characters, particularly Alex, were too-much to be believable. He was completely 'women writing men', and so single-layered that you can't even look past it for the sake of romance.
  • Alex having everyone in his back pocket was ridiculous. Absolutely bonkers as part of the plot.
  • The jump to love for Alex was completely unbelievable. He wants to have sex face-to-face, therefore we know it must be love!
  • The plot was just ridiculous after a certain point. I'm not going to go into this too much, but it was so wonderfully convenient that everything just worked out in a way that would allow them to move forward.
  • The unhealthiness of all the men in the book was completely worrying. If the reverse had been done, there would be so many "has he even met a woman??" questions
  • That ending wrap up. Ouch. <Spoiler> The year of stalking, saying "you're mine" when she wants him to leave, gifting countries worth of wealth, then the serenading at her final gallery. </Spoiler> It was just so ridiculous.
  • Her father's plot,
    and that ridiculous FBI waiting to arrest scene where he suddenly just admits everything for no reason was ??? </Spoiler>

All-in-all, a bonkers story that probably with on-the-nose writing.
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