At three and twenty, Lady Susanna Beresford is at dire risk of being considered an old maid, though she is determined that nothing but the deepest love will incline her to marry, a fact that deeply vexes her mother. As the season closes in 1810 and Susanna prepares to return home to Hertfordshire unattached, she meets the very man who will indeed change her life forever. A man whom high society would deem inappropriate and forbidden based on the very colour of his skin. But there is more to this man than meets the eye, and their meeting sets in motion a series of events that will undoubtably change society as they know it forever.

Animal Farm is an allegorical novella by George Orwell, first published in England on 17 August 1945. According to Orwell, the book reflects events leading up to the Russian Revolution of 1917 and then on into the Stalinist era of the Soviet Union. Orwell wrote the book between November 1943 and February 1944, when the UK was in its wartime alliance with the Soviet Union and the British people and intelligentsia held Stalin in high esteem. It became a great commercial success when it did appear partly because international relations were transformed as the wartime alliance gave way to the Cold War. Time magazine chose the book as one of the 100 best English-language novels (1923 to 2005). It also featured at number 31 on the Modern Library List of Best 20th-Century Novels. It won a Retrospective Hugo Award in 1996, and is included in the Great Books of the Western World selection.