The Return of Tarzan is Edgar Rice Burroughs' second novel in the series starring the man raised by apes, and the story picks up where Tarzan of the Apes left off. Tarzan finds himself back in the coastal jungle of his upbringing after being thrown off a ship by his deadly enemies.

Tarzan of the Apes is Edgar Rice Burroughs' first novel in the series starring the man raised by apes. John Clayton is born in the coastal jungles of equatorial Africa to a marooned couple from England, John and Alice Clayton, the Lord and Lady of Greystoke. But after his parents die, the infant Clayton is adopted by she-ape Kala. Raised without awareness of his human heritage, he is named Tarzan, meaning "White Skin" in the language of the apes....