Dearest Family Novels & Stories

Mom is always very strict with both my elder sisters, Esther and Emily Kingston. She always wakes them up at 5:00 am to make them study. And if they refuse to wake up, Mom will grab an embroidery needle and stab it into my arm. When fresh blood spills out, Esther and Emily will both get a fright and scramble to their desks at once to begin studying. Sometime during the year-end exam, Esther gets one easy question wrong, and I receive ten lashes with Mom's belt. Emily gets only the second-highest score in class, and I am forced to kneel on glass until my knees turn bloodied and torn. Esther and Emily feel sorry for me and fall to their knees, begging Mom to have mercy on me and promising that they will study hard and make her proud of them. Mom smiles happily and says that this teaching method works very well. However, after the SATs, Esther applies for a college out of state, and Emily tells Mom that she is eloping with a young man whom she has fallen in love with. Mom is so angry that she yanks me over and stuffs me into a huge fish tank before beginning to fill it up with water. She then takes a video of me, threatening to drown me alive if they don't listen to her and do exactly as she says. The water keeps rising in the tank. I feel scared, but I don't struggle because Mom always tells me that the only reason for my existence is to be made an example out of for Esther and Emily. She often quotes Shakespeare's "Othello", telling me about how I am the "sacrificial" dog one beats to scare a lion and teach it obedience. I think that I am considered quite a qualified dog after all, right?

The day before the final round of Beta selection, I was poisoned with wolfsbane and locked inside my burning house. The fire spread too fast, and my weakened state prevented me from shifting. My wolf, Emma, screamed in my mind, but I couldn't escape. I clawed at the door as the flames seared my skin. When I was rescued, my body was covered in burns, my skin raw and torn. Outside the operating room, I heard my mother sobbing, repeating, “It’s my fault... I locked the door by accident... I never meant to...” Alpha David, my mate, called for every healer to restore me, but his cold words to my mother were chilling: “If Serina wasn’t so vain and selfish, I wouldn’t have had to do this. Becky was fragile, struggling with depression, yet Serina flaunted her success in front of her. This is what Serina owes her.” David’s actions were meant to pave the way for Becky to become Beta, but I was the one who suffered. He claimed to be treating me well, but destroying my health and future didn’t feel like care. I pressed my hand to my bandaged chest, the numbness spreading. Emma growled inside me, weakened by the wolfsbane. I no longer wanted the love of the mother who betrayed me or the mate who was supposed to protect me. I wanted nothing from them anymore.

On the day the SAT scores are released, the reporters track me down, the top scorer of the entire nation, in order to get an interview with me. That's when they find me fishing for a corpse by the river. When the reporters ask me who I'm thankful to the most, my mom, who's allegedly been dead for ten years, makes an appearance. She gets out of the Maybach, looking very high and mighty. "Your dad didn't remarry for ten years, and you've become the top scorer of the nation. As expected, both of you have passed my test." I can only grip my pole while staring at her in confusion. It turns out that ten years ago, Mom's adopted younger brother, Donald Ferguson, suggested to her, "Why don't you fake your death and test your husband's mettle? You should pretend to go bankrupt and jump off a building. If he can stay single for your sake for the next ten years, that should prove that he didn't marry you just for your money." Mom had laughed back then. "When we were still dating, I pretended to be poor for three years. Walter could take five jobs just to put food on the table for me. It's so evident that he loves me to the moon and back. Ten years isn't a problem; heck, he'll definitely remain unmarried for 20 years, or even for the rest of his life!" The fact that I, the top scorer of the nation, am actually the wealthiest woman, Eloise Ferguson's son, gives a huge boost to the shares of her company. The entire nation looks forward to seeing Mom and me hugging each other while bawling at the top of our lungs. Mom looks around her surroundings. "Where's Walter? I'm here to take both of you home with me." "He's dead." The pole in my hands slowly cracks into splinters as I look up at Mom and spit out the answer word by word. "Three years ago, Dad kept working his ass off day and night just to buy the best burial plot for you. That was when he died in this very river."

Welcome to Ransom, Texas, where the family ties bind and love runs hot. One of the juciest pieces of gossip around town is what’s happening at The Love Barn, Ransom’s new boutique wedding venue run by the Lively siblings. Word around the tea shop is that Scarlett Lively is getting awfully close to a jilted groom. Then there’s whatever is going on with Benji! We have it on good authority he’s not just teaching his high school crush to play the guitar. And then there’s Garth, who has been noticeably missing from happy hour at The Watering Hole. Will these three break the family curse? Or are they destined to repeat it?The Love Barn is created by Sidney Bristol, an eGlobal Creative Publishing author.

In my previous lifetime, the entire medical world had acknowledged me as Godhand. But I was forced to become a scapegoat for my genius younger brother, Matthew Lachman, in a medical malpractice case, which resulted in me getting my medical license revoked and being sentenced to seven years in prison Before I was set to go to jail, my fiancee, Winona Green, personally severed my tendon in my dominant wrist just so she could force me to sign the papers. Since then, I was tormented and bullied relentlessly in jail. In the end, I died in my cold and dark cell out of depression. When I open my eyes again, I've returned to the day I'm set to go to jail as a wronged person. This time, I no longer remain depressed. I decide to continue living properly so that I can clear my name one day. In the prison, I use my amazing medical skills to save the inmates' lives and build my own connections. Since I've been on my best behavior, my sentence keeps getting reduced. That's how I get released from prison in advance. After my release, I hide my identity and open an auto repair shop on the streets. One day, my entire family barges into my shop. My mother kneels in a puddle of grease as she says pleadingly, "Jamie, Matthew is ill. You're the only one who can perform the high-precision surgery on him. Please save him!" Meanwhile, Winona clutches the engagement contract from before. With tears running down her cheeks, she promises me, "I will marry you right away as long as you can save Matthew's life!" I merely lift my hand, which is trembling so much that I can barely hold a wrench properly. A self-deprecating smile is plastered on my face this time. "Have you forgotten that you're the ones who have personally crippled my hand? Since you want me to perform that surgery so badly, does that mean you actually want Matthew dead instead?"

Mom is very biased. Every night, she will pour me a glass of milk before bedtime, simply because my grades are the best. My twin sister, Melody York, and my younger brother, Jason York, have never received this treatment before. On the night before my college entrance exam, Mom brings me a glass of milk before my bedtime as usual. But the next day, I end up collapsing in the exam venue even though I've always been healthy. Because of that, I miss out on the college entrance exam, causing me to fail. Meanwhile, Melody, whose grades have always been terrible, miraculously gets into an outstanding university. Mom consoles me, telling me that it's fine to just repeat the senior year. Every night, she prepares the same glass of milk for me as usual. Before the second college entrance exam, my cousin, Annie Wood, is staying over at my place temporarily. She wants to have a taste of my nighttime milk, only to get berated by Mom for being shameless. But halfway through the exam, I suffer from an intense stomachache all of a sudden. After that, I get sent to the hospital for emergency treatment. That year, I end up failing the exam again. But Annie, who comes from a vocational high school, gets into a pretty good university thanks to her scores. The entire family is elated, to say the least. But the fact that I have to repeat my senior year for the third time makes me the butt of everyone's jokes. I don't understand why all sorts of health problems will plague my body when it's time for my college entrance exam. When I'm taking the exam for the third time, I tell myself that this is my final chance, so I mustn't slack off no matter what. Three days before the exam, the only food I've ingested is the food offered by the school's cafeteria, just in case I run into more health problems on the day of the exam. But on the night before the exam, Mom brings me yet another glass of milk before bedtime.

After my rebirth, I avoided my family and my boyfriend like the plague. When they tried to throw me a birthday party, I faked an urgent business trip to dodge it. When my parents pleaded with me to move back, I secretly bought my own house that very night. When my boyfriend popped the question, I spun on my heel and married someone else. In my previous life, my sister and I were swept away in a raging flood. By sheer luck, a jagged tree branch snagged my clothes, saving me from the depths, but my sister drowned in the merciless current. My parents, consumed by grief and rage, gripped my throat and screamed, "If it weren't for you, Andrea would still be alive!" My boyfriend acted like it was no big deal, offering half-hearted comfort before we tied the knot. But on our wedding anniversary, during a family cruise, they cornered me on the deck and shoved me overboard. "Time to taste drowning yourself!" they hissed. It turned out they had never gotten over Andrea's death. My boyfriend had never forgotten about her. When my eyes fluttered open again, I found myself back on that fateful day. This time, I vowed to live for myself, reclaiming the joy they'd stolen from me.

Drugs disappeared during one of our family’s deals—and everyone knew it was my stepsister, Emily’s fault. Now, our rivals demanded someone be sent to them, held captive until the debt was repaid. My fiancé, my family—they all agreed it should be me. “Emily already got hurt in the mission. You are stronger. You can handle it while we figure things out.” I knew this moment was coming. And so I signed my name. In five days, I’d be sent away. And I have decided that no matter what happened—whether I lived or died—I was done with my family and my fiancé. In those last days, I gave everything I owned away. The casino? To my stepsister, who had always eyed it with envy. My checking account? To my father, who never missed a chance to remind me how useless I was. The engagement ring? Back to the man who’d been fake as hell. They didn’t notice anything off. They just smiled, pleased with how thoughtful I’d suddenly become. When they realized I was gone for good—and that their fragile Emily was their undoing—would they still smile like that? Would they still look so content?

My sister-in-law finally became pregnant at fifty. But the family parrot, Pip, suddenly said, “Abort it. Abort it.” Hearing this, I immediately forced my sister-in-law to go to the hospital to get an abortion. My brother and parents desperately stopped me. They shouted, “Have you gone mad? Do you trust an animal’s words?” I nodded and answered firmly, “Yes. I believe everything Pip says.”

My father's adopted daughter was only locked in the cramped storage closet for around fifteen minutes, yet he punished me by tying me up and throwing me inside. He even sealed off the ventilation with towels. "As Wendy's older sister, if you can't take care of her, then you should also experience how scared she was," he declared coldly. He knew I was claustrophobic, but my desperate pleas for mercy, my terror, were met with nothing but heartless reprimands. "Let this be a lesson on how to be a good sister." As the last sliver of light disappeared, swallowed by the oppressive darkness, I struggled helplessly. A week passed before my father finally remembered my existence and decided it was time to end my punishment. "Let's hope this week served as a good lesson for you, Jennifer. If this happens again, you will no longer be allowed in this house." He would never know that I had already taken my last breath in that suffocating room. My body had begun to rot in the darkness.