Beyond Her Calling {blog tour + book review}

Hello, my lovely friends!

Today is officially my day to post for the Beyond Her Calling blog tour!!

Let's just walk through how this went down, shall we? (to aid me, various Psych gifs)

Me, hearing that Kellyn was writing another book in this series:


Me, hearing that it was about Ivy's love story:


Me, hearing that it's set in SCOTLAND:


Me, hoping Kellyn will accept me as part of her blog tour team:


Me, upon seeing the ARC show up in my email inbox:


Me, finishing the book and having all the feels:


Me at Kellyn, after reading it's adorable wonderful-ness:


Okay now on to the actual review...

Beyond Her Calling

(this cover, though?  *all the heart eyes*)
Author: Kellyn Roth
Genre: Historical romance
Content: None
Main Characters: Ivy Knight, George (Jordy) MacAllen, and Violet Angel

Synopsis:
At twenty, Ivy Knight feels as if she hasn’t accomplished anything of worth. Her life stretches on before her, empty and pointless. Though her faith in God and her mental abilities have been strengthened, she still doubts herself. Does God have a purpose for a socially awkward, often confused and frightened young woman?
Jordy McAllen has just returned to Scotland after his education in London. Though he has accomplished a lot for a farm lad such as himself, he fears that what everyone has always said about him may be true: he won’t really make a good doctor. Determined to prove himself, Jordy snatches up the opportunity to become the doctor in the village of Keefmore near his parents’ farm.
Helping Jordy with his work at Keefmore seems like the perfect opportunity for Ivy. Still, she doubts herself. Is there a purpose to Ivy’s life?

What I Thought:
My first reaction after finishing the last chapter:

Me, a few moments later, while my family looks on judgementally:

I'M SO HAPPY.
(also, sorry if this gets a bit discombobulated, I wrote it last night)
Kellyn's books get better and better, oh my word!  I believe my words when I finished it (last night) were, "OH MY GOSH.  OHHHHH MY GOSH.  FRIENDS-TO-LOVERS IS MY FAVORITE. TROPE. EVER." because my heart was just bursting with happiness and I couldn't contain it.  Now, I love Alice and her husband (whose name I will not spoil because you should also read At Her Fingertips) with all of my heart, don't get me wrong.  But Ivy and Jordy? might take the top spot? and I'm not completely sure how I feel about it but I refer you to the aforementioned bursting with happiness. 
As I've already screamed, friends-to-lovers continues to solidify itself as my favorite romance trope.  Because I love friendship-centered plots ALREADY but add ROMANCE and I am SOLD.  And I just can't handle it, these two are so Pure and Good and Soft and I love them so much.  If someone who's read it could message me on Goodreads or Instagram so we can scream about the ending that'd be great 'cause I can't really do it here because SPOILERS.

*takes a deep breath* Okay, Abby, can we get out some sort of semblance of a put-together review as if we're a proper reviewer?

This series is quickly rising the ranks of my favorites list.  Just... the progression of the characters - the way our girls have grown up is so perfect.
I loved Ivy as a lead, I still (somehow) haven't read Ivy Introspective (I gotta get on that, I know), so I wasn't sure how I would feel about her.  I liked her from Alice's books, but I didn't really know her.  Through this book, I got to know her heart, and I liked what I saw a lot.  I related to her so much more than I related to Alice. 
(Also, I find it kind of funny that Ivy and Jordy's personalities are almost swapped from Alice and her husband's.  Like, Alice is the outgoing, sassy one and her husband is the sweet and loving, and Jordy's the sassy one and Ivy the sweet.  Idk, I thought it was cool.)
I loved all of the side characters too - Violet and Jordy's family and Ena, they were all so great and so rich and so real.  I felt like I could go to Keefmore and be completely at home and happy.  It gave me Mitford vibes... but Scottish.  Yeah.
I adored Alice's letters because they felt so her.  And also had me laughing out loud.  (Seriously, I snickered my way through this book and I loved every second of it) 

So all in all, I found this to be a wonderful story about growing up, trusting God, and waiting to find your calling.  It was beautiful.

Favorite Quote:

 I relate to this quote so hard, I can't even tell you.

Overall Rating: 5 beautiful sonatas out of 5

About the Author:


Kellyn Roth lives on an Eastern Oregon ranch with her parents, little brothers, border collies, cats, and a few dozen cows and chickens.  Always a lover of a good story, and especially of telling one, she's been writing since she was seven and published her first novel at fourteen.  Now a homeschool grad, she divides her time between penning her next Christian historical fiction novel, creating professionally silly articles for her blog, and her actual life.  Actual life plays second fiddle sometimes, though.

Connect with Kellyn: Her website ~ Facebook ~ Twitter ~ Goodreads ~ Google+ ~ Instagram ~ Pinterest ~ Youtube ~ Amazon ~ her personal blog ~ her review blog

There's also a very exciting giveaway going on (you could win a paperback copy of this beautiful book!!!) and you can check it out at this link right here!

A huge THANK YOU to Kellyn for letting me participate in this blog tour and read your wonderful story!  I can't wait to see what God has in store for you next ;)

And now, if you will all excuse me, I'm off to go read the last chapter again and squeal some more.


~ Abby