Mazo de la Roche, born Mazo Louise Roche, was the author of the Jalna novels, one of the most popular series of books of her time.

The Jalna series consists of sixteen novels that tell the story of the Canadian Whiteoak family from 1854 to 1954, although each of the novels can also be enjoyed as an independent story. In the world of the Whiteoaks, as in real life, people live and die, find success and fall to ruin. For the Whiteoaks, there remains something solid and unchanging in the midst of lifes transience--the manor house and its rich surrounding farmland known as Jalna. The author, Mazo de la Roche, gave the members of her fictitious family names from gravestones in Ontarios New Market cemetery, and the story itself balances somewhere between fact and fiction. Critics think events in the novels reflect de la Roches dreams, moods, and life experiences. As the daughter of a traveling businessman, she may have seen the Jalna estate as the roots she never had, while the character Finch, from Finchs Fortune, is thought to be a reflection of herself.

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