Stolen Innocence: My Story of Growing Up in a Polygamous Sect, Becoming a Teenage Bride, and Breaking Free of Warren Jeffs

“Both creepy…and quite moving.”

“Wall’s story couldn’t be more timely.”

Stolen Innocence is the gripping New York Times bestselling memoir of Elissa Wall, the courageous former member of Utah’s infamous FLDS polygamist sect whose powerful courtroom testimony helped convict controversial sect leader Warren Jeffs in September 2007. At once shocking, heartbreaking, and inspiring, Wall’s story of subjugation and survival exposes the darkness at the root of this rebel offshoot of the Mormon faith.

Her testimony put a prophet in prison. This is the true story of her fight for freedom.

• A Teenage Bride: At just fourteen years old, Elissa was forced by the prophet into a "celestial marriage" with her own first cousin, a man she loathed.
• Growing Up in a Cult: A gripping, firsthand account of life inside the FLDS, where girls are taught to ’keep sweet,’ wear pioneer dresses, and obey without question.
• The Fight for Justice: Discover the incredible courage it took for Elissa to stand up, break her silence, and deliver the powerful courtroom testimony that helped convict Warren Jeffs.
• An Inspiring Survival Story: A shocking but ultimately hopeful memoir about escaping subjugation, reclaiming her life, and finding the strength to speak truth to power.

In this courageous memoir, Elissa Wall, the star witness against polygamous sect leader Warren Jeffs, tells her inspirational story of how she emerged from the confines of the Fundamentalist Church of Latter Day Saints (FLDS) and helped bring one of America's most notorious criminals to justice.

Detailing how Jeffs's influence over the church twisted its already rigid beliefs in dangerous new directions, Wall portrays the inescapable mind-set which forced her to wed her first cousin at age fourteen, pressured her to follow Jeffs's directives, and, once she married, encouraged her to submit to her husband in "mind, body, and soul." For over three years she suffered at the hands of her husband, until one snowy night when a chance encounter with a stranger set in motion a friendship that eventually gave her the strength to break free of the church and come forward against Jeffs, so that girls still inside might be spared her cruel fate.

More than a tale of survival and freedom, Stolen Innocence is the story of one heroic woman who stood up for what was right and reclaimed her life.

“Wall’s story couldn’t be more timely. Her descriptions of the polygamous sect’s rigidity are shocking, but what’s most fascinating is the immensely likeable author’s struggle to reconcile her longing for happiness with her terror of it’s consequences.” - People

“Wall’s story is both creepy…and quite moving.” - New York Times Book Review