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Title: The Gathering Storm

Author: Peter Smalley

Narrator: Michael Tudor Barnes

Format: Unabridged

Length: 12 hrs and 59 mins

Language: English

Release date: 12-29-10

Publisher: Random House AudioBooks

Ratings: 4 of 5 out of 1 votes

Genres: Fiction, Historical

Publisher's Summary:

Spring 1791. Though deeply disturbed by a terrible incident during his previous commission, James Hayter is nevertheless on the verge of taking command of HMS Sloop Eglantine as Master and Commander when personal tragedy shatters his life. The twin blows convince Hayter that he is not fit to command and he must turn his back on the sea forever. Even the intervention of his friend and former captain, William Rennie, cannot not dissuade him from derelicting his duty.

Though repenting in the end of his decision, Hayters career in the Navy appears to be over until the intervention of an agent, Mr Brough Mappin, working for Hayters old nemesis, the British Secret Service Fund.

Mappins plan offers Hayter a chance to revive his career on a special mission, with the promise of reinstatement in the Royal Naval List if he is successful. But it is also the single most dangerous mission of his life. He must sail for France with Rennie in HMS Expedient and there rescue some persons of interest from the grasp of the French Revolutionary forces searching for them.

What no one mentions is that the rescue will bring to bear on Expedient and her crew a force so fierce and mighty that, if it can, it will wipe all trace of the incident, Hayter, and the ship from the memory of everyone involved in the forthcoming struggle.

Members Reviews:

Gathering Storm

Peter Smalley weaves another action pack novel featuring the characters from his Napoleonic period Naval Saga.. I highly recommend buying it.

A fine continuation of the series

Peter Smalley does not rest on his laurels in this latest, the fifth, in the Hayter/Rennie series. He has created a readable, interesting tale: characters we care about, a compelling story, lots of action and a window on history. James Hayter, haunted by doubts about his leadership ability and beset by tragedy at home, resigns his commission in the Royal Navy, a step he soon comes to regret. He is recruited by the shadowy agency that has already touched his life and he finds a new calling, one that gives him an opportunity to collaborate with mentor and friend, Captain William Rennie. As France reels from the Terror, Hayter and Rennie find themselves embroiled in a scheme to foil the worst excesses of the revolution. Their masters resolutely keep them in the dark and they chafe at being pawns in a game whose rules they don't understand. Nothing is straightforward in their mission and, faced with betrayal, they wind up in a desperate fight for their lives.

Smalley does a fine job of weaving his fictional narrative into the fabric of history (although he does advance the first use of the guillotine by almost a year.) To say more risks spoiling the story for new readers. Even if much of the plot is driven by events ashore, Smalley makes sure that there is plenty of shipboard action: sailing evolutions, repairs, storms, gunnery, boat actions, single- and multiple-ship actions as well as the small daily dramas that swirl around a captain at sea. These passages are the heart of historic naval fiction, and Smalley excels at them. It is aboard the Expedient that the reader finds many of the wonderful minor characters introduced in earlier books.

Hayter and Rennie make a memorable pair. While each may become impatient with the other's shortcomings, their friendship is built on genuine regard and they are fiercely loyal one to the other.