The Light in the Forest/A Country of Strangers by Conrad Richter

This exciting action story is told from the viewpoint of a teenage boy. It is a story of a four-year-old white boy captured by Delaware Indians. A decade later, treaties call for the return of white captives to their rightful ancestors forced him to return to his real family. While the story is filled with action and excitement, underlying themes focus on rejection and alienation. Throughout the world, cultures continue to clash, with ancient differences surfacing, causing strife in situations where philosophies reflect variations in modes of life. The Light in the Forest offers a perspective of history that may evoke some understanding or compassion that the world can live in greater civility and harmony.

A Country of Strangers is a companion and sequel to The Light in the Forest. It elaborates on the treatment the stolen youths receive when they return to the white culture after years in Indian captivity. This story focuses on a girl who was released at the age of fifteen, already a wife of a tribe member and mother of an infant son. She is prevented from claiming her place in the white world because of her father’s rejection. She is left without her white family and was forced to leave her Indian family behind. The story ends with the main characters from both books being brought together to search for some new country where they one day may no longer be strangers. This novel expands the picture of American Indian tribal life and the treatment of stolen children.

About the Series:

Novel/Drama curriculum units contain complete lesson plans with preliminary and follow-up work, teacher notes with plot summary, background, and rationale, ready-to-use worksheets, and suggested answers for student questions. These study guides encourage the development of thinking, reading, speaking, research, and writing skills as well as critical thinking skills such as analysis, synthesis, and evaluation.