Elinor Bratton was beautiful, well-to-do, happy�everything a young 19th century Berks County socialite could want to be�until she found herself pregnant and alone, her lover gone to pursue other interests. Her father, anxious to preserve the family�s social status, arranged a marriage between Ellie and Adam MacPhail, a poor but skilled ironworker. For Ellie, it meant legitimacy for her child and for Adam, the financing for Mt. Etna Iron Company, an iron furnace in the Juniata Valley in the wilds of western Pennsylvania. Though a match neither would have chosen, over the years the marriage brought forth five more children and a thriving iron company producing Juniata Iron, the finest in America. During its twenty-eight years, this ill-conceived marriage grew into a strong, devoted union. But along the way Adam made an enemy of Simon Trethaway, an indolent scalawag bent upon taking what he could from anyone he happened to meet. The two families thus became locked in a conflict that intensified to the point that when someone shot Adam on his son Laird�s wedding day, suspicion fell on Jude Trethaway, Simon�s youngest son. What follows is the saga of the second generation of the MacPhail and Trethaway families as told by Ellie, widowed and alone after Adam�s death, by her son Laird, upon whose shoulders the responsibility for the Mt. Etna Iron Company fell, and by her grandson, William Trethaway, son of Ellie�s oldest son, Robert MacPhail, and Caddie Trethaway, daughter of Simon. ** Q : R Genre : Historical Fiction Formats : AZW3, EPUB, ORIGINAL_AZW3, ORIGINAL_EPUB Edit : e A family saga set in Pennsylvania's 19th century iron industry, Brothers puts Laird MacPhail, son of the slain iron master at Etna Furnace, in contrast with his brothers, Robert and John. Laird's purpose is to protect and preserve the legacy left when his father, Adam MacPhail was murdered on Laird's wedding day. Aware that neither of his brothers will take on the business, Laird puts away his dreams and gets to work. Robert -- handsome, charming, and unreliable -- and John -- idealistic, dedicated and solitary - contrast with Laird's stolid, hardworking ways. Taken together, the MacPhail brothers make the consummate man. Taken one at a time, they struggle within themselves as the Civil War looms on the horizon portending suffering not yet imagined. Central to their world is the question of who killed their father. Suspicion centers on Jude Trethaway, son of Adam's old enemy. But there is no proof of Jude's guilt and it soon becomes apparent that he will get away with murder
