The Light in the Forest

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The Light in the Forest is a young adult novel first published in 1953 by U.S. author Conrad Richter. Though it is a work of fiction and primarily features fictitious charactes, the novel incorporates several real people and historical facts from U.S. history.

Set in modern-day Ohio and Pennsylvania, The Light in the Forest tells the story of a young white colonist abducted as a child by Lenape American Indians. Adopted into a Lenape family, the main character is renamed True Son and raised as if he had been born Lenape. However, in 1764, when True Son is 15, the British army, led by Henry Bouquet, demands the return of all white captives in exchange for a promise not to seize the Indians' land. Faced with this choice, True Son's Lenape family relinquishes him to the army, who return him to the white family that he no longer remembers or wishes to see.