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Title: A manipulative novel
Review: If you're an adult reader, "The Education of Little Tree" may initially make you angry at the white man's world of cruelty and racism. The story, though, relies on standard elements of sentimentality: an orphaned little boy, half Native American, raised by his grandparents who are honorable without fault, surrounded by cynical whites who take pleasure in ridiculing and hating redskins. Little Tree himself is so innocent and good-hearted that he mistakes ridicule and laughter for affection, and of course he and his grandparents are at the mercy of white power and authority. Even young readers need to know that good and evil aren't so precisely delineated, that love of the land isn't only limited to the dispossessed, and that an awareness and a certain toughness of character are more likely to ultimately triumph than passive innocence. The intent of the story is good and admirable, but its simplistic and sentimental elements do a disservice to its issues.
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