The Less People Know About Us

the long version

In a powerful memoir, identity theft expert Betz-Hamilton tells the shocking and unsettling story of her family, betrayal, and deceit. Convinced that the thief had to be someone they knew, Axton and her parents completely cut off the outside world, isolating themselves from friends and family. Small-town Indiana in the early '90s. Betz-Hamilton's parents both had their identities stolen; their credit ratings were ruined. The family changed all of their personal information and moved to different addresses, but the identity thief followed them wherever they went. Convinced that the thief had to be someone they knew, her parents isolated themselves from friends and family. Betz-Hamilton spent her formative years crippled by anxiety; her mother became paranoid, consumed by how others perceived the family. Herself a victim of the identity thief, her credit ruined, Betz-Hamilton vowed to find the thief who broke the unwritten rules of love, protection, and family. -- adapted from jacket