BOOK REVIEW - A PLAIN LOVE SONG BY KELLY IRVIN

A Plain Love Song is a fascinating read in the Amish genre, very different in it's theme of music. Since I read so many Amish novels, I appreciate it when I find novels that are a bit different from the typical Amish subjects.  It is not available until July, 2014, so I hope you put this one on your "to be read" list.  Here is my review:

Kelly Irvin has authored the third book in The New Hope Amish series, A Plain Love Song (Harvest House Publishers), and it shines brightly in the Amish genre.  The leading lady in A Plain Love Song is 18 year old Adah who is not your typical Amish girl from New Hope, Missouri.  Adah lives to make music and yearns to be a song writer.  She constantly hears music in her head and is scribbling down lyrics to the match the notes she hears.  Adah is able to listen to English music at the homes she cleans, but not at her Amish home where English music is forbidden.

Due to Adah’s overwhelming desire to make music, she has been shying away from Amish baptism which would require her to give up her iPod and the freedoms she enjoys during Rumspringa.  Unsettling to Adah, her special friend Matthew is taking his baptism classes and wants to get serious; he is ready to settle down and get married.  Adah has one foot in the Amish world and one foot in the English world, she can’t seem to decide what she wants.  Her inability to decide to take her baptism vows upsets Matthew and her parents.  Matthew wonders if he is a fool to pursue Adah when she won’t return his “I love you”.

While at one of her cleaning jobs, Adah meets an English boy, Jackson, who loves music as much as she does.  Jackson falls for Adah and knows the way to her heart is through their shared love of music.  He shows her how to play the guitar, they sing duets together, and he writes songs just for her.  Adah could not be more torn between her attraction to Jackson and her strong and comfortable feelings for Matthew.

Jackson convinces Adah to leave New Hope and run away to Branson, Missouri to begin a singing career with him.  Adah feels that Matthew has given up on her since she has not yet taken her baptismal vows.  She knows that she is disappointing her parents and family but feels this is her chance to follow her dreams to make music.  The book explores with several characters how far should one go to follow a dream.

Adah figures out what is important and necessary in her life and decides to pursue those goals.  She rediscovers the importance of her relationship with God and placing God first in her life.  Kelly Irvin has written a first rate Amish novel with a unique and more modern type of protagonist.  Kelly provides a fascinating romantic triangle and sweetly works out the problems that Adah faces.  A Plain Love Song reads perfectly as a stand-alone book within The New Hope Amish series, but readers will also want to read the first two books in the series to further their journey with Kelly Irvin’s skilled writing.  The book will be available July 1, 2014.