Last of the Mohicans

'The Last of the Mohicans,' originally published in February 1826, is a historical novel written by James Fenimore Cooper. One of the earliest distinctive American novels, the book is the second of the five-novel series called the 'Leatherstocking Tales'. Celebrated for almost 150 years as the prototype of the American adventure story, it remains a perennial favorite, an astonishingly complex work to be read on many levels. Deep in the forests of upper New York State, the brave woodsman Hawkeye (Natty Bumppo) and his loyal Mohican friends Chingachgook and Uncas become embroiled in the bloody battles of the French and Indian War. The abduction of the beautiful Munro sisters by hostile savages, the treachery of the renegade brave Magua, the ambush of innocent settlers, and the thrilling events that lead to the final tragic confrontation between rival war parties create an unforgettable, spine-tingling picture of life on the frontier. It speaks with compassion of racial injustice and prejudice, especially of the dispossession of the Indian.