Life Goes On (Epic Love Stories Book 3),

by Kelly Moore

Publication: January 8, 2019

Life Goes On

About the book:

Happy Go Lucky Olivia McDill adores her fairy-tale life, married to the man of her dreams. It’s a love that should’ve lasted a lifetime…then in the blink of an eye, everything changed.

She learns too quickly that life can be unfair, and she’s left trying to pick up the pieces and make sense of things on her own.

She’s angry, heartbroken, and no longer wants to face her days, but with the help of a friend and someone totally unexpected, she’s inspired to find her way.

She soon learns Life Goes On…even when you don’t want it to.

My Review

I would think by now that most of my followers are aware of my love for all things Kelly Moore. Life Goes On just added to my love and admiration for this incredible writer! This novel begins with the deliriously happy Olivia and her husband Silas after a day on the river in North Carolina. After seventeen years of marriage, Silas and Olivia are still crazy in love as they enjoy a weekend getaway at the family cabin. Unfortunately, their seemingly perfect life suddenly changes leaving Olivia unsure of how to move on with her life. But with the help of her and Silas’ best friends Noah and Charlie (and of course her super cool dog Murphy), Olivia slowly begins to see that light at the end of the tunnel and find happiness in her life once again.

There are several funny moments in this novel, as well as, steamy/romantic moments, adventurous moments, and so on. But let me get this out of the way – this one will require a great deal of Kleenex. I was crying five minutes into this one and was crying again in the ending (along with several times in between), but there were happy tears along with the sad ones.

I absolutely loved Olivia in this novel from beginning to end. It’s rare for me to truly like all of a character’s qualities for the duration of a novel, especially in Olivia’s case and everything she dealt with, but Olivia was a fabulous character. The secondary characters were also fantastic – especially Clay! Silas was wonderful, sexy, romantic, smart, adventurous, and just pretty close to perfect. However, something about Clay grabbed me and I must admit that I fell madly in love.

Olivia’s journey that is put in place by Silas is a painful one, but also, it was a beautiful process of rediscovering herself as a person separate from her spouse. If you have seen P.S. I Love You, it’s a similar premise but more updated for today and without the volatile and sometimes toxic relationship they had in the movie. But this also reminded me a lot of A Star is Born (latest version with Bradley Cooper). Silas writes Olivia a song and later plays it for her and the words and emotions reminded me so much of the wonderfully romantic and heart-wrenching song that Lady Gaga performs at the end of the movie. Again, this was a total Kleenex moment!

Kelly Moore has truly written an epic romance in Life Goes On. This novel took me on an emotional roller-coaster ride of joy, sadness, hope, excitement, and most of all, contentment. The characters are perfectly developed making you feel as if you are there in the story. It’s fast-paced, yet, not at all rushed. The situations and circumstances were, unfortunately, realistic and relatable – which adds to the Kleenex issue but draws you into the story. I can’t provide an exact number, but including co-authored books, this is probably around my 17th or 18th time reading Kelly Moore’s writing. It is such an honor and a joy to continue reading and reviewing her novels. This author pours her heart and soul into her writing and her talent continues to grow with each and every book. You know when you go into someone’s house and see book upon book by the same author on their shelves? Kelly Moore takes up quite a bit of mine and I know will continue to do so as long as she keeps thinking up all of these wonderful characters and plots. I highly, highly recommend this novel to any fans of contemporary romance, but especially those that appreciate a fresh start when faced with a sudden change or loss.

**Oh, I have to add one more thing! One of my favorite things (besides Clay, of course) was the amazing places and experiences within the novel from North Carolina to Scotland to New Zealand, and so on. Kelly and I share a love of the outdoors and the Nantahala in N.C. so it was so much fun to read about all of the amazing experiences had by Olivia, Silas, Charlie, and Clay in all of the different places.

*Many thanks to Kelly Moore for providing this ARC in exchange for my honest review!