Product Description

The aftermath of war, and the slow dawning of a new era of freedom and opportunity, shape the destinies of the Cazalets in the final volume of this magnificent family saga. Polly, Clary and Louise, now grown up, are ready to discover the truth about the adult world. While Rupert, Hugh and Edward must make the choices that will decide their own - and the family's - future.

For the Cazalets, and all those close to them, one end is another beginning...

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #24400 in Books
• Published on: 2009-08-07
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 9999 pages

About the Author

Elizabeth Jane Howard is the author of fourteen highly acclaimed novels, most recently Love All. The Cazalet Chronicles - The Light Years, Marking Time, Confusion and Casting Off - have become established as modern classics and were adapted for a major BBC television series. In 2002 Macmillan published her autobiography, Slipstream. In that same year she was awarded a CBE in the Queen's Birthday Honours List.

Customer Reviews

An excellent read if you have read the others first...
This book is an excellent continuation of the Cazalet chronicle (book 4). As with the other three (the Light years, marking time, confusion) it revolves around a large extended family which can get a bit complicated. But the characters are brilliantly drawn and you get completely integrated into their world. It has moments of poignancy, happiness, despair.... it's a cracking good read if you like detailed, thoughtful books.

A truly stunning and remarkable book.
The Cazelt story, is a truly stunning and remarkable read. The author, Elizabeth Jane Howard, is a beautiful writer with an excellent imagination. She not only introduces the reader to the characters, but draws you into their world.

Casting off, is not only a beautifully written novel, but is also an excellent historical reference, giving facts, as well as an insight into the emotional hardships of living in a country at war.

After reading only a few pages of the novel, the reader has been drawn into the world of the characters. Howard's writing not only draws you into their world, but allows you to know the characters as well as, or prehaps better than, the reader knows their own friends. By the end of the novel you find yourself feeling real emotions for the characters and their sitaution.

Howard is an excellent writer who, as yet, has not been given the recognition she deserves for her writing.

Beautiful, yet simple
Casting Off is the beautiful, and simply written conclusion to the saga of the Cazalet family. It is best to read the preceding three books first, as reading them out of order will only serve to ruin plots and increase confusion!

It shows how even the simplist privations of the war years have affected the entire family, and how the end of the war is seen not as an ending, but as a new beginning. Edward and his daughter Louise use it as an opportunity to consider the future of their loveless marriages; Clary to pursue her writing career; Zoe and Rupert to start again with one another.

The three girls, who in a sense have been at the heart of the series since The Light Years - Polly, Clary and Louise - are all setting off on vastly different paths on the road to happiness, often coming to surprising conclusions along the way.

It is an excellent conclusion to the series, as it ties off many loose ends, yet leaves the reader wondering just what happened next.