This was a really upsetting and heartbreaking story. I felt so bad for Valerie and everything she went through and how the Mormon faith ended up hurting her more than helping. I understand not everyone In that religion is as staunch or right winged about it but it’s hard to understand how many blind eyes were turned just because a man “goes to service on Sunday” the forward written by Amy Smart was really powerful and also amazing how it all tied together.

This is an investigative style of storytelling that worked really well on audiobook. The story centers around one woman, Valerie, and her story is heartbreaking in many ways. This book does more than simply tell Valerie's life story--it digs into the root causes: environmental factors, patterns of sexual abuse, generational trauma, and the pervasiveness of these themes within the Mormon church, in these small towns in Idaho, and within families. It's a difficult book that is well researched and interesting.

This book was good but I had to DNF due to the emotions it was giving me. It was well researched and I liked that Elizabeth Smart did a forward. I think it was a little longer than needed as there was some padding but overall I would recommend it to those interested.

Wow... this book is incredibly difficult to rate. I don't want to say I enjoyed it; that definitely is not the right word. I think this book was well researched, written, and delivered for the audiobook (although I think it was a little longer than it needed to be). Devastatingly heartbreaking and sickening.

I only listened to a few chapters in this book, but it’s my fault for not really finding out what the book was about. I thought it was a story of a Mormon community, maybe one of the communes. Instead it was a story of rape and sexual abuse. I don’t enjoy reading true life stories like this. For anyone who likes true life stories like this topic, the book is written in an interesting manner, with multiple point of views of different people in the town. There are a lot of people and names mentioned in the book, and at points it was hard to keep track of everyone. My heart is broken for what the main woman and others like her had to go through, and I just could not keep listening.

TW/CW: Drinking, miscarriages, infertility, rape

*****SPOILERS*****
About the book:
Valarie Clark Miller seemed to have it all. Smart, beautiful, and athletic, with a wealthy, successful husband and growing family, Valarie appeared to be the picture-perfect Mormon wife. But it was all a façade. Inside, she was crumbling from the pressures of long-repressed memories of a childhood plagued with sexual and physical abuse.
Release Date: April 2nd, 2025
Genre: Non-fiction
Pages: 314
Rating: ⭐ ⭐ ⭐

What I Liked:
1. Elizabeth Smart doing the forew

What I Didn't Like:
1. Info dumping for padding

Overall Thoughts:
{{Disclaimer: I write my review as I read}}

Oh for God's sake why did I need 10 pages of being told about the land in Utah?? What did that have to do with her story?


I can't keep going with this book. I respect the story for what it's worth but I'm not here for what color the leaves were in 1925.


Final Thoughts:
I know that we have to set the base for the book and learn who everyone is but there are seriously people who don't matter being talked about. I am so bored and I am only 50 pages in and I am pulling the plug. Such a shame I wanted to know who this amazing person was but this book is so weighed down with padding and things that don't do anything for the story.

IG | Blog

Thanks to Netgalley and Greenleaf Book Group Press for this advanced copy of the book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.
3 likes

Hometown Betrayal is one of those difficult stories to hear but is also one that is so important to get out there for people take notice so it doesn’t happen to someone else.

Author Emily Benedek details the life story of Mormon, Valerie Clark Miller, who experienced extreme highs and lows throughout her life while dealing with the trauma of persistent childhood abuse at the hands of those in authority or who should’ve protected her as a child.

Benedek leaves no stone unturned as she details not only the abuse, but the recovery of Valerie’s memories and the subsequent devastation to her life the trauma continued to bring her.

Told him a very sympathetic and respectful way, I feel that this story helps show the true effects victims go through in such devastating circumstances.

The audiobook narration by Maria Mcann was a perfect match for this subject, and she delivered the material in a frank and feeling manner. Some of the moments were very difficult and Mcann dealt with the subject with the respect it deserved. As for narration in general, her voice and cadence was easy to listen to, and she provided a good pacing for the book.

I just finished a good audiobook. Hometown Betrayal by Emily Benedek was very entertaining. It's available now.

Check your trigger warnings!

This book covers the horrific abuse Valerie Clark experienced growing up in a LDS/Mormon small town growing up. The small town community was very patriarchal and as a result wasn't set up well to help her. The descriptions of what happened to her were intense. Be prepared when reading.

A great book to read but please check your trigger warnings.

This book goes into depth of the life of Valery a Mormon that went through extreme trauma within her Mormon community. It also explains how she tried to cope and the long term effects it had on her and her family.

There is various research and insights into her life from many perspectives to help understand the trauma. And the ending is somewhat satisfying but not really. This book will for sure stay with me in a good way. I would highly recommend it to everyone as we all need to understand this subject/trauma as it can happen to anybody.

I love all things Mormon/LDS, so when I spotted this audiobook on NetGalley I hit request straight away.

The book starts with an introduction from Elizabeth Smart, a Mormon, who was famously abducted, repeatedly raped and held hostage for 9 months. She sets the tone, the belief and the understanding behind this closed community.

One of the repeated comparisons mentioned in this book is the idea of offering someone a pre chewed piece of chewing gum. You wouldn’t want it and that’s how females who have had premarital sex were seen, so regardless if it was consensual or not, your future and chance to reach the celestial kingdom were tarnished.

This book explores how these little towns breathe so much sense in fraternity, self regulation and god fearing people. Valerie Clark kept her abuse secret, until the trauma of her daughter’s accident unearthed it. We see how the community uses denial and slander and how the stress caused Valerie towards addiction, two divorces and her children finally fighting for justice.

Although this book is set in the past, I was not exactly shocked when one of the cast members on Secret Lives of Mormon Wives, Mikayla shared her experience of sexual assault/trauma and how her mother didn’t believe her, reconfirming this culture/society/closed group haven’t moved much farther.

Thank you so much to NetGalley and Greenleaf Book Group Press for this copy

Hometown Betrayal: A Tragic Story of Secrecy and Sexual Abuse in Mormon Country by Emily Benedek (book cover is in image) is the story of how an entire town and community with ties to the LDS church, was aware of the abuse Valerie Miller suffered and looked the other way. I anticipate that there will be some challenges with how this book will be received, since Valerie's memories were recovered using the unconventional and unreliable method of hypnosis.

This book is a very challenging read because it is about sexual assault, so I recommend that readers be sure they research all of the trigger warnings before diving in.

The narration by Maria Mcann was good but not great, feeling uneven in pacing at times. The writing overall is great, but it does read more like non-fiction true crime reporting that a biography. Nonetheless, I do really recommend this book for those who liked Scout Camp by James Remer or The Tell by Amy Griffin.

Thank you Greenleaf Audiobooks | Greenleaf Book Group Press and NetGalley for the opportunity to listen to this ALC. All opinions are my own.

Rating: 4 Stars
Pub Date: Apr 01 2025

#GreenleafAudiobooks
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Hometown Betrayal is a powerful and unsettling true account of trauma, survival, and the dark undercurrents that can lurk beneath the surface of seemingly idyllic communities. Emily Benedek masterfully weaves together Valarie Clark Miller’s harrowing personal story with broader investigative journalism to expose systemic abuse and institutional cover-up within a tightly knit Mormon town.

The audiobook format enhances the emotional intensity of the story. The narrator’s delivery is clear, deliberate, and respectful—capturing Valarie’s vulnerability without dramatizing her pain. Her voice lends weight to the testimonies and interviews, which are handled with care and gravity.

While the book tackles difficult subject matter, it does so with compassion and journalistic integrity. The pacing occasionally slows during the deeper dives into background context and legal proceedings, but these sections are important in illustrating the broader cultural forces at play.

This is not an easy listen, but it's a necessary one. Hometown Betrayal is a courageous chronicle of one woman’s fight for justice, and a chilling reminder of how silence and power can shield abusers. Highly recommended for listeners interested in true crime with a social conscience.

Thank you to NetGalley and Greenleaf Books for the Audio ARC!

I have some fundamental issues with this book. Hypnotism-recovered repressed memories are notoriously and inherently a flawed situation. This book had me intrigued in the small-town terror and the shadows of a small community, but then it came to light that the atrocities that two local men were accused of by a young woman were discovered by repressed memories via hypnotic trance. Absolutely not. I cannot trust that things happened as described. I'm sure it FELT real to Valarie, but the track record of implanted or altered memories 'recovered' by this technique is proven to not be trustworthy. I blame the psychologist.
I DNF'd this about halfway through, and I feel awful for every person involved, but this feels more than a little gross and inflammatory. To base a whole book on what happened here and NOT discuss the possible and probable issues with the way that these accusations came to light is irresponsible.
Definitely cannot recommend.

Hometown Betrayal by Emily Benedek
Audio Version
Overall Grade: B-
Information: B-
Writing/Organization: B
Narration: B
Best Aspect: Interesting and very detailed story.
Worst Aspect: Tough to listen to in many parts, check trigger warnings.
Recommend: Yes.
Available Now. Thanks NetGalley for this audio book.

The people in Valarie's life failed her. Failed her monumentally. This was truly heartbreaking and absolutely made me so enraged. So many times throughout this book, you just want to find Valarie at any point in her life and lead her out and away, to anywhere else but where she was, physically and mentally. And sadly and tragically, she wasn't the only victim that was targeted.

This was evil at the core set in a small town that made way too many excuses. The book detailed plenty of different events throughout Valarie's life as well as the events beyond just her. It was a storytelling project, not an in-depth research, but it did enough to make you emotionally hyped with rage and fury. And beyond that, just simply feeling sorry for Valarie and the other girls. The girls never stood a chance. Proceed this book with caution, and it's something that needs to be spotlit so the perpetrators could be hunted down and rightfully punished, because this was most likely still happening.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for a copy of this. All opinions are my own.

Thank you #netgalley, #greenleafaudiobooks and Emily Benedek for the ARC of #hometownbetrayal in return of my honest review.
Hometown Betrayal by Emily Benedek feels like a biography of a Mormon mom and wife, and the abuse she suffered and how it impacted her and those who loved her lives, even after her death. Though a feel of biography, it's actually a true crime deep dive of sexual abuse and Mormon religion and culture and the search for answers. It does speak of Valarie's mental health and health struggles. It was such a deep read that I recommend.

I feel bad rating this somewhat low because it’s someone’s real, traumatic story, but I just didn’t enjoy the style. There seemed to be way too much detail about certain things that didn't really seem relevant, and for some reason the narrator taking on different voices for reading different peoples’ quotes kind of irked me.

Hometown Betrayal is a heartbreaking true story about one woman constantly being let down by the community that should have been protecting her.

You have any experience with sexual assault, make sure you evaluate how prepared you are to read this book and face your own trauma. Also be aware that there is discussion of mental illness and chronic illness. Mental illness can really affect your body. I wonder if some of Valarie’s health conditions were made worse by the trauma she suffered in her life.

It is frustrating to hear about how victims are not taken seriously especially by religious communities and even law enforcement.

I think the book would’ve had more of an impact if it had been condensed to maybe half of the book. I did find myself losing interest and getting lost in what was happening.

The title and cover fit perfectly to the book. The narrator, Maria Mcann, did a great job of voicing the story.

Thank you to NetGalley, Emily Benedek, Maria Mcann and Greenleaf Audiobooks for the opportunity to read Hometown Betrayal. I have written this review voluntarily and honestly.

This was a horrible excellent read 💔

Emily Benedek's "Hometown Betrayal" is an unforgettable journey into the devastating power of misplaced trust. From the outset, Benedek crafts an idyllic world, only to dismantle it, brick by painful brick. The shock isn't just in the act of betrayal, but in the painful realisation that the very foundations of what you believed were solid were instead built on quicksand. You feel Valarie’s disbelief, anger, and profound sense of loss – not just of a relationship, but of a perceived reality.

This book is a chilling reminder that sometimes the greatest dangers lurk in the faces we see every day, in the hands we shake, in the voices we trust. It’s a story that will make you question, make you hurt, and ultimately, make you reflect on the fragility of human connection and the devastating consequences of deceit. "Hometown Betrayal" isn't a light read; it's a profound, often painful, journey through the landscape of a broken heart and shattered trust, leaving a lasting mark.