The Breaking Storm

The Breaking Storm follows Gathering Clouds as the second book in the gripping Nethergate Trilogy of the American Civil War. The shocks of war electrify the already dysfunctional community at the Nethergate Tobacco Plantation, throwing conflicts into stark relief as the slave community senses the alchemy of impending freedom. Romance, passion and compassion surge to the fore in unlikely places as the story moves rapidly between South and North, between battlefield and parlour, before finally taking to the seas to the hedonistic Island of Nassau to run the gauntlet of the Yankee naval blockade. 


Derek H Skinner was educated at Christ’s Hospital and Sandhurst. He joined the York and Lancaster Regiment and later The Royal Army Ordnance Corps. He saw service in the UK, Berlin, BAOR Germany, Aden, Cyprus, Hong Kong and Belize. After thirty years soldiering, he launched out as a Schoolmaster at Cheltenham College Junior School for sixteen happy and fruitful years. He retired to Down Ampney, near Cirencester in Gloucestershire.  In ‘retirement’ Derek has worked as a volunteer for an Army charity, became Parish Councillor, School Governor and is currently a Church Warden. He took up writing with serious intent and published his first novel, Gathering Clouds in 2018. He is Chairman of The Cotswold Writers Circle and is now working on editing the final draft of the third book to complete The Nethergate Trilogy.