Kilteegan Bridge Story

Kilteegan Bridge, Ireland 1963. On the face of it, life is idyllic for Eli and Lena Kogan. Living in their beautiful house in the Irish countryside, their children are growing up happy and safe surrounded by a loving community. So when a letter arrives one day threatening to shatter their peaceful and prosperous world, Lena and Eli have no option but face the dark reality of their situation. How best to do that, is something that drives a wedge between them. As a Jewish child, escaped from Germany in 1939, Eli is all for letting those dark days where they belong, for him, there's no future in the past. But for Lena, it's different. She knows that the only way she can move her family forward in peace is to first go back, and there is only one man who knows the whole truth. From rural Ireland to wartime France, What Divides us, tells a tale of loyalty and love, resentment and revenge, that has far reaching consequences for the Kogan family, the unravelling of which might just destroy their future.

Kilteegan Bridge, Ireland. 1975 Despite the best efforts to the older generation to maintain standards, short skirts, long hair and loud music are all the rage in Kilteegan Bridge. Emmet Kogan has set his sights on an education at the prestigious Stanford University in California, while his cousin Nellie also longs to get away, but for very different reasons. If she's to escape too, it will mean wrapping herself in a web of lies, but it's a price she's willing to pay. Lena and Eli are terrified they will lose their boy to the bright lights of America forever, while Emily and Blackie make a decision to keep a dangerous secret, despite knowing the damage such duplicity can do. On the exciting streets of 1970s San Francisco, two young Irish people have to learn to navigate this new world of wonderful opportunities and dangerous vices, and learn that no matter how open and accepting a society is, there are always rules. Rules that if broken, carry a heavy penalty.

Kilteegan Bridge, Co Cork, Ireland. 1975 Lena Kogan is thrilled when her son Emmet invites her to the opening of his first building in San Francisco. It's awkward that she will be staying with Emmet's father Malachy Berger, but he's in a serious relationship now, and anyway, he knows how Lena feels about Eli, so surely they can just be friends. Her sister Emily, is less adventurous. She's happy to stay at home with her family and a thriving business, that is until her daughter Nellie drops another bombshell on her about what she plans to do next. A move nobody could have anticipated and few support. Her brother Jack is living contentedly on his farm with Skipper, until a couple of late-night visitors cause them to risk everything they've guarded so carefully. Intervening to help could mean exposure in a state where men like them are on the wrong side of the law, but some things are just too important to ignore. In this final book of The Kilteegan Bridge Story, the O'Sullivans come to a silent understanding of each other and of themselves.