I tried.

Really, I did. I wanted to finish it — it’s my last book for the Classics Challenge.

But… I just couldn’t. And I can’t see why this is supposed to be a classic. The back said it was “Tragic, fast-paced, and stocked with the elements of a classic frontier adventure — massacres and raids, innocent settlers, hardened soldiers, renegade Indians, and a doomed love affair.” I thought it was plodding, confusing, violent and irritating. I bailed soon after one of the “good” Indians, Chingachgook, brutally killed an innocent French soldier, and Hawk-eye said this: “‘Twold have been a cruel and unhuman act for a white-skin, but ’tis the gift and natur [sic] of an Indian and I suppose it should not be denied! I would wish, though, it had befallen an accursed Mingo (slang for the “bad” Indians) rather than that gay, young boy, from the old countries!” I guess I’m just not the audience James Fenimore Cooper had in mind.