Sign-In
Cart
The Lies They Told
Audio Book
General FictionHistorical FictionLiterary Fiction
Currently unavailable to order
Please enter your email and a message will be sent to you when this product becomes available on our website.
Publisher: Recorded Books
Published: Jul 29 2025
Language: English
In rural 1930s Virginia, a young immigrant mother fights for her dignity and those she loves against America's rising eugenics movement--when widespread support for policies of prejudice drove imprisonment and forced sterilizations based on class, race, disability, education, and country of origin--in this tragic and uplifting novel of social injustice, survival, and hope for listeners of Susan Meissner, Kristin Hannah, and Christina Baker Kline.
When Lena Conti--a young, unwed mother--sees immigrant families being forcibly separated on Ellis Island, she vows not to let the officers take her two-year-old daughter. But the inspection process is more rigorous than she imagined, and she is separated from her mother and teenage brother, who are labeled burdens to society, denied entry, and deported back to Germany. Now, alone but determined to give her daughter a better life after years of living in poverty and near starvation, she finds herself facing a future unlike anything she had envisioned.
Silas Wolfe, a widowed family relative, reluctantly brings Lena and her daughter to his weathered cabin in Virginia's Blue Ridge Mountains to care for his home and children. Though the hills around Wolfe Hollow remind Lena of her homeland, she struggles to adjust. Worse, she is stunned to learn the children in her care have been taught to hide when the sheriff comes around. As Lena meets their neighbors, she realizes the community is vibrant and tight knit, but also senses growing unease. The State of Virginia is scheming to paint them as ignorant, immoral, and backwards so they can evict them from their land, seize children from parents, and deal with those possessing inferior genes.
After a social worker from the Eugenics Office accuses Lena of promiscuity and feeblemindedness, her own worst fears come true. Sent to the Virginia State Colony for the Feebleminded and Epileptics, Lena face impossible choices in hopes of reuniting with her daughter--and protecting the people, and the land, she has grown to love.
3 different editions
Also available
Also from
Wiseman, Ellen Marie
The Orphan Collector: A Heroic Novel of Survival During the 1918 Influenza Pandemic
Wiseman, Ellen Marie
Paperback
What She Left Behind: A Haunting and Heartbreaking Story of 1920s Historical Fiction
Wiseman, Ellen Marie
Paperback
The Lost Girls of Willowbrook: A Heartbreaking Novel of Survival Based on True History
Wiseman, Ellen Marie
Paperback
The Plum Tree: An Emotional and Heartbreaking Novel of Ww2 Germany and the Holocaust
Wiseman, Ellen Marie
Paperback
Coal River: A Powerful and Unforgettable Story of 20th Century Injustice
Wiseman, Ellen Marie
Paperback
Also in
Historical Fiction
James Fenimore Cooper: The Leatherstocking Tales Vol. 1 (Loa #26): The Pioneers / The Last of the Mohicans / The Prairie
Cooper, James Fenimore
Hardcover
Anniversaries, Volume 2: From a Year in the Life of Gesine Cresspahl, April 1968-August 1968
Johnson, Uwe
Paperback
The Pirate Queen: A Novel from the New York Times Bestselling Author of the Frozen River
Lawhon, Ariel
Hardcover
The Moonlight Runner: A Gripping Historical Novel of Survival, Bravery, and Romance
Robards, Karen
Hardcover
The Pirate Queen: A Novel from the New York Times Bestselling Author of the Frozen River (Large Print Edition)
Lawhon, Ariel
Paperback
The Amalfi Curse: A Bewitching Tale of Sunken Treasure, Forbidden Love, and Ancient Magic on the Amalfi Coast
Penner, Sarah
Paperback
A Pair of Aces: Reese's Book Club (Large Print Edition)
Murray, Victoria Christopher
Benedict, Marie
Paperback
Murder on the Orient Express: A Hercule Poirot Mystery: The Official Authorized Edition
Christie, Agatha
Paperback