Tragic Backstory Examples Novels & Stories

To celebrate our daughter's eighteenth birthday, my husband, James Miller, decided to go nude cycling. I told him he was too old for that and would embarrass himself, but he looked at me with disdain and said, "Liliana, your life is so boring. You refuse to embrace new things." Then he brought the dog belonging to his first love, Sophia Lewis, and placed it before me. It was then I realized it was Sophia who had organized the nude cycling event. I felt my anger boiling beneath the surface as our son, Thomas, took the leash and handed it to me. "Dad, you can go have fun with Sophia. Mom will take care of the dog," Thomas said. But when the dog lunged at me later, Thomas protected it. Meanwhile, my daughter, Alice, fought to shield me. In the end, both Alice and I were bitten to death. James didn't even take us to the hospital. Instead, he dragged our bodies straight to the crematorium. Just before I turned into a wisp of smoke, I saw Alice rolling in the flames. During that time, James and Thomas were comforting Sophia. At that moment, I felt a deep rage—rage at myself for being so naive and for causing my daughter's death. When I opened my eyes again, I found myself back on the day when my son handed me the leash. This time, I was determined to make them all pay.

My husband, who was a drug enforcement police officer, personally got me into rehab. My son was cheering on the side, saying that he no longer had to see me under the influence for a long time. After I was discharged, I discovered my husband moved in with his lover and our son. I begged him to come back and told him that someone would kill me. He did not believe me. Instead, he said coldly, “If you die, you better end up in a trash can. Otherwise, I’d have to deal with your body.” My son cheered at the side. “Mommy is finally gone!” After a week, I was dismembered. My body parts were found in multiple trash cans. He was the police in charge of the case.

Everyone said my good looks were what saved me from my family's downfall. It was how I managed to become a Donna. I was the only one who knew why he had to compromise to marry me. Xavier Whitmore, the tall and handsome Don, was unable to have physical relationships with a woman. When I shyly took off the gown on our wedding night, he sat in his chair and lit a cigarette before remarking in an icy voice, "I'm allergic to women. That said, you have my word that you will be the only woman in my life." He kept his promise. Though he never so much as touched me in the five years of our marriage, he provided me with a life of luxury and wealth. Although it was merely a title, being his only woman brought me happiness. Everything changed on the day my men and I were ambushed by a rival mafia family. We barely made it out alive. When I returned home, I found him locked in a tight embrace with his widowed sister-in-law, Alice Ortega. "Alice, I won't let you remarry. If you do, I'll make sure that man dies a thousand deaths." I scoffed. It wasn't so much that he couldn't handle being physical with a woman. It was simply that he could not be physical with anyone but her. In that case, she could have the pleasure of being the Donna.

In order to help my family take over the Vitales' casino that's based in North Melcina, I conceal my identity as the sole daughter of Don Leonardo Ricci and begin working as a dealer in Las Vogis. During my undercover mission, I get close to Mattia Vitale, the heir of the Vitales, on purpose. At the same time, I secretly get my hands on the Vitales' weak points. Not only does Mattia not realize my intentions, but he also showers me with love and affection. He doesn't hesitate to gift me jewelry worth millions of dollars. Sometimes, he surprises me with fireworks worth tens of millions of dollars. In fact, he once burns a contract worth a hundred million dollars just to light my cigarette. As I stand under the sky filled with fireworks in Las Vogis, I hear my heart pounding wildly in my chest. Hence, I reject my dad's decision to devour the Vitale family. I thought I finally found true love. But lately, Mattia hasn't been coming home that much now. He also grows colder toward me. In fact, he even announces to everyone else that I'm just his personal assistant at his family gathering. His excuse for hiding our relationship is that he's worried his family elders might target me. But what he doesn't know is that when he almost lost his net worth at the gambling table, I was the one who secretly swapped the cards, allowing him to make a victorious comeback. I plan on telling Mattia the truth on his birthday, and I've already drafted a business deal between my family and his as a surprise for him. But I end up witnessing Mattia being entangled with another woman from my position outside his office. That woman is Ginevra Bellini, the heiress of the Bellini family, a nouveau riche family that has earned their gold from real estate in North Melcina. The Bellinis are as wealthy and powerful as the Vitales, so to the Vitales, Ginevra is the most perfect and suitable marriage partner to Mattia. So, it turns out that Mattia has already labelled his love accordingly. I'm just the bargaining chip that he has chosen to discard after weighing the pros and cons. With a sneer on my face, I toss the contract into the shredder. Then, I call my dad's number. "Do it, Dad. Let's devour the Vitales."

I'd been married to Matteo—the Lamberti Don—for five years. No one knew I was his wife. I didn't want the perks. The spotlight. So I stayed invisible. We were in love. Still felt like dating every single day. Then my first day at the new hospital wrecked everything. "Dr. Accardi, you won't believe this." A coworker leaned in, grinning. "Guess who that new patient's husband is? Matteo freaking Lamberti." I froze. If she was his wife—then who was I? She was pregnant. Carrying the future Lamberti heir. So what did that make the baby inside me? I held it together. Did the exam. Played the calm, capable doctor. No one saw the panic clawing through me. I told myself it was gossip. Lies. It had to be. Then I heard Matteo call her 'my princess.' That was it. He had a new 'princess.' And I had to let him go.

On my coming-of-age ceremony, the pack elder has given me two choices—either marry Alpha Darius Vilkas, or enter a marriage alliance with the Solaris Pack. I choose the latter. Everyone in the Silvermoon Pack thinks I've gone nuts. After all, they know very well that I've been clinging to Darius for more than ten years. Every year, I make the same birthday wish, which is to become his mate. In my previous life, I got what I wanted. On the night of the full moon, Darius bit me on my nape and marked me. But Darius, who kept up a gentle and polite image in front of others, glared at me with only hatred brimming in his eyes behind locked doors. "If it wasn't for your shameless request to the elder, who forced me into mating with you, Ingrid wouldn't have entered that marriage alliance!" Only then did I realize that Darius was in love with my younger sister, Ingrid Whiteclaw, this whole time. In order to get revenge on me, Darius slept with various she-wolves every night. He made me endure the heartwrenching pain through our mate bond. On the day I was meant to go into labor, Darius personally fed me wolfsbane, which killed both me and my pup. Now that I'm reborn, I decide to grant his wish to be with Ingrid. But when he finds out that I'm about to enter the marriage alliance, he goes crazy from rage.

When she married Harry Slate, she was 22 years old while he was 32. During their three years of marriage, he showered her with endless tenderness and would give her anything she wanted. He said he could pick the stars for her if she wanted, even the moon if she so wished. He spoiled her like she was a precious treasure. The only thing was that he had insatiable demands every night. He would chuckle and refuse to let her go, even when she cried and begged for mercy. She knew Harry had a lot of money and a lot of love—and all of it belonged to her. The day her father passed away, she called him 99 times, yet he declined every single one. The next second, she received a photo taken by her best friend. [Celine, is this your man? I saw him hugging a woman on the streets of Palto.] After tapping the photo and seeing the man and the woman, Celine Quest felt as though she had fallen into an icy abyss. The man was Harry, and the woman was her aunt.

For three years, Emerie had been married to Allan, the son of an Alpha. Allan had always believed it was Emerie who drugged him, forcing him into the marriage. Determined to divorce her, he chose to be with her sister Jolene instead. But what he didn’t know was that Emerie was already terminally ill when she left him. When Allan finally uncovered the truth and desperately searched for her—could he still win her back?

I had just returned from a business trip. The moment I stepped through the door, I scooped my wife into my arms and rushed her straight to the bathroom for a steamy shower together. We were kissing passionately when, out of the corner of my eye, I noticed something: the toilet seat was flipped up. I froze. Seven years ago, my wife had read a post online claiming that when men pee standing up, bacteria splash onto the seat. She begged me to sit down to pee for the sake of her health. I have kept that promise. For seven years of marriage, that seat has never been up. A knot formed in my stomach, but the bathroom was spotless, so clean it looked staged, not a single stray hair anywhere. Then I noticed the shower temperature. It was set five degrees lower than her usual 43°C. Men like cooler showers. Women like them hotter… At that moment, I knew, Ruby Lynch had cheated on me.

Christmas Eve was meant to be the culmination of seven years of long-distance longing—the day Lorenzo finally slid an engagement ring onto my finger. Instead, a sudden emergency surgery chained me to the operating table. The patient wasn't just suffering from a premature delivery and catastrophic hemorrhaging; she was riddled with infections, the biological fallout of a reckless, hedonistic lifestyle. The girl on the table spat out orders with a venomous entitlement that made my blood run cold. "My husband is the head of the Corleone family. He’s second to none, and this entire city bows to him. If you can’t save my baby, you’re all dead." My mind went blank. There was only one head of the Corleone family: Lorenzo. "You’ve got the wrong man," I said, my voice wavering despite my frown. "The news said he’s already engaged to a woman from a rival family for a strategic alliance." The girl looked at me as if I’d just told a pathetic joke. She surveyed me with a mocking sneer. "Oh, he’s mentioned that woman. He said she’s like a cold corpse—that even touching her makes him sick to his stomach. She doesn't provide him a fraction of the pleasure I do." She smirked. "He heard something happened to the baby. He’s en route from Sicily right now with his personal detail." She flicked her phone screen open. There it was: a photo of her and Lorenzo, locked in a suffocatingly intimate embrace. I froze. A second later, a notification from Lorenzo vibrated against my palm. “Darlin’, something urgent came up tonight. I’m skipping the engagement dinner. I’ll make it up to you later.” Since they were so utterly in love, I decided to give them exactly what they wanted. I dialed a number that had been silent for three years—the number of the true mastermind of the underworld, Don Sebastian. "Does your proposal from three years ago still stand?"