Publication July 29, 2025 by Kensington

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 readers 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.

My thoughts:

Eugenics is an extremely evil ideology that many people look away or don’t want to believe people would go to such extremes, especially in the United States. I’ve had many discussions over this topic with people online and in person who even defend it still to this day. I may get a lot of criticism for say this but it still goes on to this very day. They may “try” to disguise it but if you really pay attention, you will see the truth.

I have been reader of Ellen Marie Wiseman’s work since her first publication. I applaud her for her bravery in exposing people’s struggle, abuse, oppression and often death at the hands of people in power.

Wiseman doesn’t hold back with the opening of her story and we are meeting Magdalena (Lena), her mother and brother for the first time at Ellis Island. How they were treated was subhuman. My emotions were high at the very beginning of this story and there were times I had to step away but I finished the story and I am more than glad I did. The Lies They Told is a beautifully written story and I appreciate Wiseman’s ability to do so because of such a heartbreaking story to write. Also, her character development is outstanding and her focus on the human mind and heart is what drives this story to the reality of this fallen world we live in. That said, there are beautiful and happy moments in this story and even in the end but I still felt completely sadden despite the outcome.

A must read.

I obtained an ARC from the publishers through NetGalley for an honest review.

I must caution you, there is suicide scene in this story.  

Stephanie Hopkins