First published in 1936,Whiteoak Harvest chronicles the 1930s saga of Renny Whiteoak and his wife, Alayne. Finch Whiteoak and wife, Sarah, return from their honeymoon to upset the Jalna household with Eden Whiteoak's love child. Meanwhile Wakefield Whiteoak is engaged to Pauline Lebraux but is tormented by religious doubts. This is book 11 of 16 inThe Whiteoak Chronicles. It is followed by Wakefield's Course.

Mazo de la Roche, in 1927, was an impoverished writer in Toronto when she won a $10,000 prize from the American magazine Atlantic Monthly for her novel Jalna. The book became an immediate bestseller and was eventually adapted for stage, screen, and television.