This 1913 novel traces the history of one man, Mark Lennan, from his eighteenth year through his forty-eighth. But Galsworthy's real focus is the women in Mark's life. Each phase of his adulthood focuses on a women – his mother, then wife, then daughter, represented by "Spring," "Summer," and "Autumn," respectively. A contemporary review in the New York Times called the book "his most vital novel."