When the bridge that joins a small Irish valley cracks under stormwater, the people who cross it—by love, by duty, by faith—find themselves testing what can truly hold.

At the river's edge, Siobhán O'Rourke keeps her family steady with the stubborn grace her mother taught her. Across the bank, Jamie Quinn, a stonemason who once left the parish for good, returns to help rebuild what washed away. Between them lies more than a river: old silence, shared history, and the work of learning how to speak again.

In the long season of mending, tea replaces apology, laughter interrupts grief, and a chorus of neighbours weaves itself around the house. A mother counts flour by handfuls, a child names every colour of rain, and a bridge—slowly, stubbornly—rises from the silt. As the months turn, the O'Rourkes and the Quinns learn that keeping a community upright isn't about never breaking; it's about holding fast, plank by plank, until the span is sound again.

River Between Us is a luminous novel about ordinary heroism—the kind that bakes bread before dawn, holds a lantern in a storm, and thanks the water even when it takes. With lyrical realism and quiet Irish wit, Laura Carpenter paints a portrait of resilience where love isn't loud, but lasting; where mercy is manual labour; and where family, however bruised, keeps crossing back to one another.

This is not a story of grand rescue or ruin, but of everyday grace: a kettle kept warm for a neighbour, a bolt tightened against the wind, a child learning to count to a hundred because her mother asked her to. Set against a river that remembers everything, River Between Us reminds us that faith in each other is the truest structure we build—and the only one built to last.

Perfect for readers of Claire Keegan, Maggie O'Farrell, and Sarah Winman, this tender, beautifully crafted novel celebrates the strength of small things and the quiet, unbreakable pulse of home.