Twisted Love (2021) is a new adult contemporary romance by Ana Huang. It is the first installment in the Twisted series, a quartet of interconnected love stories focused on the lives of four friends: Ava, Bridget, Jules, and Stella. In addition to being a TikTok phenomenon, the book is also a USA Today, Publishers Weekly, and IndieReader bestseller.

Told from alternating first-person perspectives, Twisted Love follows the lives of Ava Chen and Alex Volkov as they develop a passionate, all-consuming romance while attempting to confront and overcome the traumas of their pasts. Twisted Love explores The Lasting Effects of Childhood Trauma, The Vulnerability of Intimacy, and The Power in Submission.

This guide refers to the paperback edition published by Bloom Books in 2022.

Content Warning: The source material features depictions of domestic violence, attempted murder/drowning, child abuse, mentions of suicide, and aquaphobia/panic attacks.

Plot Summary

Twisted Love begins with Ava Chen stranded in the wilderness after a photography shoot with a client. When Ava’s brother, Josh Chen, cannot give her a ride back to their neighborhood, his best friend Alex Volkov bears the responsibility. The car ride is tense with strained conversation and barely contained hostility that demonstrate the emotional distance between Alex and Ava. At Josh’s going-away party, Alex agrees to protect Ava from the ongoing threat of her problematic ex-boyfriend while Josh volunteers in Central America for a year. Because Alex could not protect his family from suffering tragic deaths years ago, he knows he will put tremendous pressure on himself to keep Ava safe, and the resulting anxiety triggers a flashback of his family’s murders and leaves him shaken. Throughout the party, various women compete for Alex’s attention, but adhering to his belief that emotional vulnerability is a weakness he cannot afford, Alex does not return their interest.

Josh leaves for Central America, and Alex moves into Josh’s house to keep a closer eye on Ava. Alex is chief operating officer (COO) for the company that he and his uncle Ivan built together, and the coldness of his corporate life often bleeds into his personal life. Determined to form a warmer relationship with Alex, Ava bakes cookies and earns an invite inside his house. They open up and tell each other about their respective memory issues; Alex has highly superior autobiographical memory (HSAM) or hyperthymesia, which allows him to remember every detail of his life, and Ava has no memories before the age of nine, a fact that foreshadows her later recovery of traumatic repressed memories. This vulnerable conversation causes Alex to shut down.

During a weekly catch-up with her friends—Jules, Bridget, and Stella—Ava agrees to implement “Operation Emotion,” a series of tests they design to trick Alex into showing any emotion, because he’s notoriously emotionless. After weeks of failing, Ava lands on the last stage of Operation Emotion: jealousy. Even so, Ava’s attempts to elicit emotion from Alex have allowed their connection to grow. Their initially hostile remarks to each other have lessened and they engage in occasional flirting. When Alex displays jealousy at seeing Ava dancing with another man at a college charity gala, his rare display of emotion represents a turning point in their relationship. During a tender moment of intimacy at his house, he witnesses one of Ava’s many inexplicable night terrors—an effect of her childhood trauma surrounding water and drowning.

In the following months, Alex and Ava attempt to resist their mutual attraction. Ava’s attraction is fueled by sexual desire, and her appetite for Alex only grows stronger when Alex’s ex-fling, Madeline Hauss, mentions his dark preferences in the bedroom. The information is meant to deter Ava, but instead it only deepens her interest. Alex’s interest in Ava grows against his will and is exacerbated by their forced proximity due to his promise to Josh. When Alex sees a video on social media showing Madeline pushing Ava—who can’t swim, and whose childhood trauma involves drowning—into a pool, his frantic reaction attests to the depth of his feelings for Ava. After the incident at the pool, Ava asks Alex to teach her how to swim.

Ava throws Alex a birthday party, an occasion that he has not celebrated since his parents were alive. Alex opens up to Ava about his family, and they share a heated kiss before Alex cuts the physical contact short and calls it a mistake, retreating once again. A few weeks later, they both give into their desire for one another, having sex at a hotel and then dating in earnest. When Thanksgiving arrives, Alex and Ava spend the holiday with her father, Michael Chen. During their stay, Ava’s repressed memories resurface, and she realizes that it was her father, not her mother as she thought, who attempted to kill her twice when she was a child: once by almost drowning her, and once by smothering her with a pillow. (Michael’s resentment and violent actions were motivated by his resentment at Ava’s very existence; she is a product of his wife’s infidelity and is not his biological daughter.) Alex helps Ava take legal action against her father, and Ava and Josh have a heart-to-heart discussion about their family and their status as siblings.

Meanwhile, Alex works on plan to avenge the murders of his family; he believes the culprit to be his father’s business partner: Ava’s father, Michael Chen. (Although Alex’s romantic feelings for Ava are genuine, he has strategically become close to her and Josh over the last eight years to gain access to Michael and exact revenge for his parents’ murders.) Now, Alex uncovers a series of letters that implicate his uncle Ivan Volkov in the murders, not Michael. After weeks of distancing himself from Ava to plan his revenge on Ivan, Alex is called to Ivan’s home to find that his uncle, realizing that Alex discovered his secret, has kidnapped Ava and Bridget to blackmail Alex into giving Ivan full control of the company he owns. Fearing Ivan might orchestrate their deaths regardless of what he does, Alex stalls for time by telling Ava about the lies he has told both her and Josh to get closer to Michael in pursuit of his misguided vengeance. He lies again, claiming that he never loved her and that the relationship was a means to an end. Ivan realizes that Alex has poisoned his green tea, and Alex kills his uncle outright while Ivan is distracted. When the “police” (a clean-up team that Alex employs to erase his messes) arrive, Ava hopes that Alex will give her an explanation that will absolve him from the betrayals he claims to have committed against her and her family. However, Alex makes no move to defend himself, leaving Ava heartbroken. Alex and Ava spend months wallowing in misery until Ava decides to conquer her fear of water, swim alone, and fly to London for the World Youth Photography (WYP) fellowship of her dreams.

When Alex hears that Ava is headed to London alone, he admits to himself that he loves her, but he does not arrive at the airport in time to catch her flight. Two weeks after arriving in London, Ava starts to heal. Alex comes to London and asks for forgiveness, but Ava’s trust has been broken, and she rejects his advances. Alex remains in London for a year, waiting outside Ava’s apartment every morning to bring her breakfast and walk her to work. At the end of Ava’s fellowship, Alex gives a speech and sings a vulnerable song at her art exhibition. The two reconcile and spend the night together alone at the exhibit. The epilogue, occurring four months after Alex and Ava return to the United States, shows them happily together, celebrating Thanksgiving with Alex’s Krav Maga instructor, Ralph, and Ralph’s wife, Missy. Josh is still angry with Alex and has yet to accept the idea that Alex and Ava are together, but the pair have faith that he will eventually come around.