Description

Published 1948: First UK Edition / Hardcover / Very Good Condition

Original green cloth with gilt titles on the spine. 408 very clean and bright pages, mild speckled endpapers. Boards slightly rubbed with time consistent with age. (HQ03)

Postage €6.95 including additional books ordered.
An Post prepaid postage envelopes within the Republic of Ireland, with no weight restrictions from €6.95.

In Return to Jalna, the Whiteoak family reunites after a year of separation. Piers, Renny, and Wakefield return in 1943 during the Second World War. Finch has been off on a concert tour, and Maurice has come home from Ireland. Fifteen-year-old Adeline returns from school and is now the stunning reflection of her namesake. It's a time of change and strain, but the family remains united against all others.

Canadian author, whose popular Jalna saga has been translated into many languages. Her first book in the series was published in 1927 - in total it consists of 16 volumes and made de la Roche one of the most popular novelists. The series covers 100 years of the wealthy Whiteoak family history, and it is partly based on de la Roche's own experiences. The central characters are Adeline Whiteoak, his grandson Eden and his half-brother Renny, his wife Alayne with a number of spouses, ex-spouses, and spouses-to-be. Archer, Alayne's son, summarizes the theme: "The family has been the structure of all our lives. We don't think about it. It's like the air we breathe. It is sacred to us."

Mazo Roche (she later added the 'de la' to her name) was born in Newmarket, in rural Ontario, the setting for most of her fiction. She was the only child of William Roche, a salesman, and Alberta (Lundy) Roche. During her marriage, Alberta moved seventeen times. After the death of her parents, de la Roche moved also from place to place. In her childhood her parents adopted her orphaned cousin, Caroline Clement, who became her lifelong companion. Although her family wasn't rich, she spent some years as a child on a farm owned by a wealthy man who farmed as a hobby. There de la Roche began to develop her fantasy world of rural aristocracy. H. (Rache) Lovat Dickson, her close friend and editor later said, that the Whiteoaks were "idealized conceptions of ancestors whom... [Google Books]