The Woodlanders

The Woodlanders is vintage Hardy. The story revolves around the young woman Grace Melbury who returns to the leafy world of Little Hintock and soon finds herself at the centre of a number of tragic events. In penetrating incisive and beautiful prose Hardy tells a moving tale of unrequited love as fate and the constraints of society thwart the happiness of our heroine. The leafy world of Blackmoor Vale and the hamlet of Little Hintock are all lovingly described by Hardy who named The Woodlanders as the favourite of all his novels; upon re-reading it 25 years after its publication he claimed with certainty it was the book he liked ?best of all?.