“Describe a significant event in your life and how it has influenced you.”

From Elizabeth Eulberg’s Past Perfect Life.

17-year-old Ally Smith’s life is pretty good; while she and her construction worker father used to move all the time, they have finally found a forever home in their small Wisconsin town.  As her eighteenth birth day gets closer, Ally is focused on keeping her grades up, applying for college and scholarships, babysitting to help cover what the scholarships won’t, hanging out with her friends, and enjoying life’s simple traditions with her dad.  Ally and her closest friends (including bestie Marian and crush Neil) are all stressing about the big life changes the next few months will bring, but then a denied college application causes Ally’s life to shatter.  When the police and FBI show up at her house claiming that she was kidnapped fifteen years ago by her father, Ally is swept away in a confusing world of newfound family, custody, and press.  As her father confesses everything, Ally finds out that her real name is Amanda Linsley, that along with Paula, a mother that she’d always been told was dead, she also has a Stepfather (Craig) and young stepsister (Sarah) desperate to see her again in Florida.  Against Ally’s wishes to stay and finish her senior year in Wisconsin, her mother brings the minor Ally to Tampa where she is bombarded with unfamiliar relatives, wealthy living, and a whole slew of convicting emotions.  While Ally struggles to connect with her family, she struggles with a past full of lies and a future full of uncertainties.

Eulberg’s writing style, while a bit mellow, is engaging for readers, creating a characters and situations that are captivating.  The trauma of the truth is the real focus of the story and the underlying conflict between Ally and her mother creates a lot of drama, however, the book is hard to put down.  Past Perfect Life is an interesting look at an unimaginable situation that provides an interesting read.