After a thirty-five year career in the pastoral ministry, Robert Brookover retired in 2005 to pursue his love of writing. Along with his wife, Marion, they moved from Manassas, Virginia to Tampa, Florida. He enjoys grandchildren, poetry, bridge, tennis, golf and a vigorous exercise routine. He is a graduate of Ferrum College, Randolph-Macon College, and Boston University.

His lifelong interest in the American Civil War began at the age of seven during a trip with his grandparents to Gettysburg. In 1960, as the war’s centennial commemorations began he sought every opportunity to listen to and witness historical presentations that depicted the soldier’s life.

Fortuitously, his family moved to Virginia. After his calling into the ministry, he served in towns such as Elkton and Woodstock in the Shenandoah Valley, the city of Winchester, and lastly, Manassas. Not only did the libraries in those communities contain journals and letters written by soldiers and families during the war, he found a treasure of stories and tales that descendents of Virginians shared. From those individuals, he garnered a different perspective on the war than he learned during his formal education. Southerners, he found, believed in the Constitution, believed in States’ Rights, and some believed in their responsibility to solve the issue of slavery rather than allow the Federal Government to coerce them. As a result, Mr. Brookover has sought to incorporate the stories he’s heard and the letters and journals he’s read into a four-part series of historical fiction, entitled, Wish Is My Master.