The Trees

By Conrad Richter,

Book cover of The Trees

Book description

“They moved along in the bobbing, springy gait of a family that followed the woods as some families follow the sea.” In that first sentence Conrad Richter sets the mood of this magnificent epic of the American wilderness. Toward the close of the eighteenth century the land west of the…

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Why read it?

2 authors picked The Trees as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

The West used to begin in Ohio. Some of my ancestors moved there around 1816. Their experiences must have been very similar to those of the Lucketts family depicted in The Trees by the masterful writer, Conrad Richter.

The trees so closely grown and tall, one could not see through them or over them. They had to be toppled. Children got lost in the trees while playing; some never made it back to their homes. Lost forever.

The rich narrative, reminiscent of pioneers’ old diaries the novelist read prior to writing, fills the reader’s ear with character, honesty, pathos, and…

From Venetia's list on the old west with in-depth characters.

A beautiful first sentence: “They moved along in the bobbing, springy gait of a family that followed the woods as some families follow the sea.” Then a powerful saga of the settlement of the Ohio River Valley at the end of the eighteenth century, the next move west from Kentucky. At once optimistic and anguished, American history as Chekhov might have written it.

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