Sylvia Foti
Against her grandmother’s wishes, award-winning author Silvia Foti made a promise to her mother on her deathbed to write a book about Jonas Noreika, her grandfather, a famous WWII hero. She had no idea that her seemingly simple promise would uncover dark family secrets. Foti’s discoveries would bring her to a personal crisis, challenge her Catholic faith, unearth Holocaust denial, and expose an official cover-up by the Lithuanian government.
Foti’s twenty-year investigation resulted in her latest book, "The Nazi’s Granddaughter: How I Discovered My Grandfather Was a War Criminal," which reshaped her family and exposed an official cover-up by the Lithuanian government in the process. Foti’s discovery has undone a national narrative in Lithuania which converted Holocaust villains like Silvia’s grandfather into war heroes.
In this video, Silvia Foti shares how writing this book shaped her identity, re-shaped her family’s past, and exposed European countries’ denial of their role in the Holocaust.
Sylvia Foti Nominated for Nobel Peace Prize
Sylvia Foti is the first non-Jewish Lithuanian in history ever to be nominated for the most prestigious peace prize in the world.
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My grandfather wrote the 'Mein Kampf' of Lithuania: Here's what it says
Sylvia Foti expected WWII hero Jonas Noreika's booklet to be a rallying cry to patriotism. She was not prepared for what she found instead.
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No More Lies. My Grandfather Was a Nazi.
In Lithuania, he was celebrated as a hero. But we can’t move on until we admit what he really did.
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Storm in the Land of Rain: A Mother's Dying Wish Becomes Her Daughter's Nightmare by Sylvia Foti
An award-winning journalist discovers that her grandfather, the legendary and heroic Lithiuanian "General Storm" who survived a Nazi concentration camp only to later be executed by the Russians, may also have been a Jew-killing antisemite. A fascinating story of bravery, betrayal, and the transformative power of seeking and finding the truth at whatever the cost.
Hero–or Nazi?
Silvia Foti was raised on reverent stories about her hero grandfather, a martyr for Lithuanian independence and an unblemished patriot. Jonas Noreika, remembered as "General Storm," had resisted his country’s German and Soviet occupiers in World War II, surviving two years in a Nazi concentration camp only to be executed in 1947 by the KGB. His granddaughter, growing up in Chicago, was treated like royalty in her tightly knit Lithuanian community.
But in 2000, when Silvia traveled to Lithuania for a ceremony honoring her grandfather, she heard a very different story—a "rumor" that her grandfather had been a "Jew-killer."
Storm in the Land of Rain is Silvia’s account of her wrenching twenty-year quest for the truth, from a beautiful house confiscated from its Jewish owners, to familial confessions and the Holocaust tour guide who believed that her grandfather had murdered members of his family.
A heartbreaking and dramatic story based on exhaustive documentary research and soul-baring interviews, Storm in the Land of Rain is an unforgettable journey into World War II history, intensely personal but filled with universal lessons about courage, faith, memory, and justice.
Previously published as The Nazi's Granddaughter.
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