First published 2017
Conrad Richter built his literary career around the American frontier, setting his novels across different periods of westward expansion. His work began in pulp magazines during the 1930s before evolving into acclaimed full-length fiction. Richter won the 1951 Pulitzer Prize for The Town, the final volume in his Ohio frontier trilogy The Awakening Land. He also received the 1961 National Book Award for The Waters of Kronos. His novels explore the tensions between different ways of life on the changing frontier. The Sea of Grass depicts conflict between ranchers and farmers in late nineteenth-century New Mexico. The Light in the Forest follows a white boy raised by the Lenape who struggles to readjust to white society after being returned as a youth. Richter wrote from Native American perspectives, showing how violence and change affected both Indians and whites during this turbulent period. His trilogy traces the transformation of Ohio wilderness into industrial civilization through the story of Sayward and her family.
Genres: american-fiction, historical-fiction, 20th-century, american, 19th-century
Vibes: atmospheric, emotional, thought-provoking
Tropes: change, conflict, transformation
Setting: Ohio, New Mexico
Period: Late 19th Century, Early 20th Century
30 pages · Paperback · Independently published