“
How many wives have told their husbands, “I’m fine,” when they really mean, “I want to cut your balls off with a butcher knife”? How many men have told their girlfriends, “You look fine,” when they really mean, “You need to go back to the gym and work out—a lot.” It’s the universal way of saying we’re just peachy—when we’re really anything but.
”
”
Emma Chase (Tangled (Tangled, #1))
“
The lamb misused breeds public strife
And yet forgives the butcher's knife.
”
”
William Blake
“
I used the knife.
I saved a child.
I won a war.
God forgive me.
”
”
Jim Butcher (Changes (The Dresden Files, #12))
“
He took a long draw then asked, “What’d I do?”
“You knew about the guy threatening my dad?”
He paused, shifted in his chair, so freaking busted, it wasn’t funny. “They told you?”
“Why, no, Swopes, they didn’t. Instead, they waited until the guy knocked the fuck out of my dad and readied him for spaceflight with duct tape then tried to kill me with a butcher’s knife.
”
”
Darynda Jones (Second Grave on the Left (Charley Davidson, #2))
“
Dr. Warthrop chopped off my finger with a butcher knife.
”
”
Rick Yancey (The Isle of Blood (The Monstrumologist, #3))
“
The shrill voices of those who give orders
Are full of fear like the squeakings of
Piglets awaiting the butcher's knife, as their fat arses
Sweat with anxiety in their office chairs....
Fear rules not only those who are ruled, but
The rulers too.
”
”
Bertolt Brecht
“
What is that in his hand?"
"A cleaver. As in-"
"Butcher's knife."
"You got it."
"I hope not."
"He does not look happy."
"Are you sure it's a he?"
"I don't want to know.
”
”
Ridley Pearson
“
You're a punk?'
'What?'
'What do they call people from the eighties?' I asked.
'Oh,' she laughed. It was a beautiful laugh. 'I'm my mother, actually. I mean, these are her clothes from High School. I guess I should tell people I'm Cyndi Lauper though, or something, because dressing up as your mother is pretty lame.'
'I almost dressed up as my mother,' I said, 'but I was worried what my therapist would say.'
She laughed again, and I realized that she thought I was joking. It was probably for the best, since telling her the second half of my mom costume - a giant fake butcher knife through the head - would probably freak her out.
”
”
Dan Wells (I Am Not a Serial Killer (John Cleaver, #1))
“
Mary started to scream, and then the curtains parted further and a hand appeared, holding a butcher's knife. It was the knife that, a moment later, cut off her scream.
And her head.
”
”
Robert Bloch (Psycho (Psycho, #1))
“
He had noticed my bandaged hand.
"An accident," Warthrop said tersely.
"Dr. Warthrop chopped off my finger with a butcher knife."
Von Helrung's brow knotted up in confusion. "By accident?"
"No," I answered. "That part was on purpose.
”
”
Rick Yancey (The Isle of Blood (The Monstrumologist, #3))
“
Fine’s a funny word, don’t you think? I don’t think there’s another like it in the English language
that says so much while actually saying so little. How many wives have told their husbands, “I’m
fine,” when they really mean, “I want to cut your balls off with a butcher knife”? How many men have
told their girlfriends, “You look fine,” when they really mean, “You need to go back to the gym and
work out—a lot.” It’s the universal way of saying we’re just peachy—when we’re really anything
but.
”
”
Emma Chase (Tangled (Tangled, #1))
“
What's for dinner, Dad?" Pelops asked.
Tantalus had never liked his son. I don't know why. Maybe Tantalus knew the kid would take over his kingdom someday. Greek kings were always paranoid about stuff like that. Anyway, Tantalus gave his son an evil smile and pulled out a butcher's knife. "Funny you should ask.
”
”
Rick Riordan (Percy Jackson's Greek Gods)
“
Bloody hell," he gasped. "Harry. There's a *knife* in my leg. When did *that* happen?"
"In the duel," I told him. "Don't you remember?"
"I thought you'd stepped on me and sprained my ankle," Ramirez replied. Then he blinked again. "Bloody hell. There's a *knife* in my guts." He peered at them. "And they match.
”
”
Jim Butcher (White Night (The Dresden Files, #9))
“
Like a butcher sharpening knife on knife
I sharpen heart on heart inside me.
”
”
Yehuda Amichai (The Selected Poetry of Yehuda Amichai)
“
Then she did see it there - just a face, peering through the curtains, hanging in midair like a mask. A head-scarf concealed the hair and the glassy eyes stared inhumanly, but it wasn’t a mask, it couldn’t be. The skin had been powdered dead-white and two hectic spots of rouge centered on the cheekbones. It wasn’t a mask. It was the face of a crazy old woman. Mary started to scream, and then the curtains parted further and a hand appeared, holding a butcher’s knife. It was the knife that, a moment later, cut off her scream.
And her head.
”
”
Robert Bloch (Psycho (Psycho, #1))
“
No one was standing in the shadows smoking a cigarette or looking about with a shifty-eyed gaze. I couldn't see anyone quickly hiding a bloody knife behind his back or twirling a moustache, either. That ruled out the Dudley Do-Right approach to finding the killer.
”
”
Jim Butcher (Summer Knight (The Dresden Files, #4))
“
The Jews should have offered themselves to the butcher's knife. They should have thrown themselves into the sea from cliffs. As it is, they succumbed anyway in their millions.
”
”
Mahatma Gandhi
“
The bird hovering over a tiny seed eventually fell upon the seed. How will his life end, whether in a cage or under the butcher’s knife – who knows what will happen?
”
”
Munshi Premchand (Nirmala (Best of India Classics))
“
England once there lived a big
And wonderfully clever pig.
To everybody it was plain
That Piggy had a massive brain.
He worked out sums inside his head,
There was no book he hadn't read.
He knew what made an airplane fly,
He knew how engines worked and why.
He knew all this, but in the end
One question drove him round the bend:
He simply couldn't puzzle out
What LIFE was really all about.
What was the reason for his birth?
Why was he placed upon this earth?
His giant brain went round and round.
Alas, no answer could be found.
Till suddenly one wondrous night.
All in a flash he saw the light.
He jumped up like a ballet dancer
And yelled, "By gum, I've got the answer!"
"They want my bacon slice by slice
"To sell at a tremendous price!
"They want my tender juicy chops
"To put in all the butcher's shops!
"They want my pork to make a roast
"And that's the part'll cost the most!
"They want my sausages in strings!
"They even want my chitterlings!
"The butcher's shop! The carving knife!
"That is the reason for my life!"
Such thoughts as these are not designed
To give a pig great piece of mind.
Next morning, in comes Farmer Bland,
A pail of pigswill in his hand,
And piggy with a mighty roar,
Bashes the farmer to the floor…
Now comes the rather grizzly bit
So let's not make too much of it,
Except that you must understand
That Piggy did eat Farmer Bland,
He ate him up from head to toe,
Chewing the pieces nice and slow.
It took an hour to reach the feet,
Because there was so much to eat,
And when he finished, Pig, of course,
Felt absolutely no remorse.
Slowly he scratched his brainy head
And with a little smile he said,
"I had a fairly powerful hunch
"That he might have me for his lunch.
"And so, because I feared the worst,
"I thought I'd better eat him first.
”
”
Roald Dahl
“
I work at the deli counter. Have to give people their succulent, chemical-ridden salami and whatnot.'
I pictured Miles in a dark room, standing at a butcher's block with a large knife in one hand, a blood cow's leg steadied under the other, a huge Cheshire grin spreading over his face--
'I bet the customers love you,' I said.
”
”
Francesca Zappia (Made You Up)
“
When Pang was barely out of toddlerhood, she zoomed in and out of the apartment unsupervised, playing with plastic bags and, on occasion, with a large butcher knife.
”
”
Anne Fadiman (The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down: A Hmong Child, Her American Doctors, and the Collision of Two Cultures)
“
You don't learn knife skills at cooking school, because they give you only six onions and no matter how hard you focus on those six onions there are only six, and you're not going to learn as much as when you cut up a hundred.
”
”
Bill Buford (Heat: An Amateur's Adventures as Kitchen Slave, Line Cook, Pasta-Maker, and Apprentice to a Dante-Quoting Butcher in Tuscany)
“
Anyone who has ever tried to write a novel knows what an arduous task it is, undoubtedly one of the worst ways of occupying oneself. You have to remain within yourself all the time, in solitary confinement. It's a controlled psychosis, an obsessive paranoia manacled to work completely lacking in the feather pens and bustles and Venetian masks we would ordinarily associate with it, clothed instead in a butcher's apron and rubber boots, eviscerating knife in hand. You can only barely see from that writerly cellar the feet of passers-by, hear the rapping of their heels. Every so often someone stops and bends down and glances in through the window, and then you get a glimpse of a human face, maybe even exchange a few words. But ultimately the mind is so occupied with its own act, a play staged by the self ofr the self in a hasty, makeshift cabinet of curiosities peopled by author and character, narrator and reader, the person describing and the person described, that feet, shoes, heels, and faces become, sooner or later, mere components of that act.
”
”
Olga Tokarczuk (Flights)
“
Thank you," Becky whispered... "I wouldn't have survived that stool. It would have been 'Humpty Dumpty had a great fall.'"
With rings on your fingers and bells on your toes even, " he said.
"Curious that meeting you is more nursery rhyme than fairy tale. If I see a farmer's wife with a butcher's knife, I'm running and not looking back."
"And I'll have no nonsense from my dish and spoon.
”
”
Shannon Hale (The Actor and the Housewife)
“
Ethan stood there, his face blue and wrinkled, his lips pulled into a rictus grin. In one hand, he clutched a butcher knife. Blood splattered his hands and face. 'Mommy slipped,' he whispered, and plunged the knife into my leg
”
”
Julie Kagawa
“
Your lack of survival instincts is supremely distressing," Riko said. "Take that look off your face before I carve it off." Neil hadn't realized he was smiling too, a cruel look he'd inherited from his father. Neil lowered his cup so Riko could get a better look at it. "I would love to see you try. You think I'm afraid of your knife? I'm the Butcher's son.
”
”
Nora Sakavic (The Raven King (All for the Game, #2))
“
I work in grand halls and bedchambers with wine and perfume. Not in dark alleyways with cloaks and knives. I don’t like knives. I don’t even own a knife. And my cloaks are far too expensive to risk bloodying.
”
”
Jim Butcher (Academ's Fury (Codex Alera, #2))
“
I went into the bends. I got drunker and stayed drunker than a shit skunk in Purgatory. I even had the butcher knife against my throat one night in the kitchen and then I thought, easy, old boy, your little girl might want you to take her to the zoo. Ice cream bars, chimpanzees, tigers, green and red birds, and the sun coming down on top of her head, the sun coming down and crawling into the hairs of your arms, easy, old boy.
”
”
Charles Bukowski (Post Office)
“
People hate these shows, but their hatred smacks of denial. It's all there, all the old American grotesques, the test-tube babies of Whitman and Poe, a great gauntlet of doubtless eyes, big mouths spewing fantastic catchphrase fountains of impenetrable self-justification, muttering dark prayers, calling on God to strike down those who would fuck with their money, their cash, and always knowing, always preaching. Using weird phrases that nobody uses, except everybody uses them now. Constantly talking about 'goals.' Throwing carbonic acid on our castmates because they used our special cup annd then calling our mom to say, in a baby voice, 'People don't get me here.' Walking around half-naked with a butcher knife behind our backs. Telling it like it is, y'all (what-what). And never passive-aggressive, no. Saying it straight to your face. But crying...My God, there have been more tears shed on reality TV than by all the war widows of the world. Are we so raw? It must be so. There are simply too many of them-too many shows and too many people on the shows-for them not to be revealing something endemic. This is us, a people of savage sentimentality, weeping and lifting weights.
”
”
John Jeremiah Sullivan (Pulphead)
“
Mallor reached into a pocket and tossed a pair of hazel eyeballs onto the table. They bounced softly and wobbled to a bloody stop next to the butcher's knife. "Go untie the man in my room, and see to it that he gets those back.
”
”
Shawn Wickersheim (The Penitent Assassin)
“
As the brother put the carving knife aside, he said, "Stuffing?"
"Am I breathing?"
Phury shoved a spoon into the bird and piled high. "Mashed?"
"Do you have gravy?"
"Am I breathing?"
V cracked a smile. "Roger that. And affirmative on the gravy."
When a plate was put in front of him, he glanced up. "No veggies? Not that I'm looking a gift horse in the mouth."
"Vegetable matter is a waste of porcelain space." Phury pushed a knife and fork across the butcher block. "Ask yourself, would I sacrifice the surface area of mashed or stuffing for peas?"
"I love you.
”
”
J.R. Ward (The Thief (Black Dagger Brotherhood, #16))
“
Unbelievable,” Audrey’s voice squeaked as I pushed past her. “Here we are, talking to you about your freaky little-boy encounter back in Breaux Bridge and how your caramel macchiato tasted like cardboard, and boom! You just zone out like one of the kids from Children of the Corn.”
“Um, Aud, babe … I don’t think those kids zone out. They’re just freaky twenty-four-seven. It’s a year-round thing.” Gabe’s response drew a half-hearted laugh from me, but it was quickly reined in when I reached the Book of the Ancients.
“Whatever, Gabriel,” Audrey said to him. “My point is, it’s freaky, okay? She gets this glazed-over look in her eyes, like she’s gonna whip out a butcher knife and go all Michael Myers on us or something.”
I glanced over my shoulder to cock an eyebrow at her.
“Oh, now you pay attention.” She cocked an eyebrow back.
“What is it with you and the cheesy horror-movie references?” Gabe muttered.
“Hey, now. Halloween is a classic,” Gavin scolded him. “Don’t go hating on the classics.
”
”
Rachael Wade (The Tragedy of Knowledge (Resistance, #3))
“
Mother is the master of a thousand voices, and she uses each one with the skill of a butcher wielding a knife.
”
”
Teri Brown (Born of Illusion (Born of Illusion, #1))
“
The killer’s got a chainsaw/boat hook/butcher’s knife and this girl’s got zip: no upper body strength, no mass, no shotgun. All she’s got is good cardio and an all-American face.
”
”
Grady Hendrix (The Final Girl Support Group)
“
I regularly covered my chest in stage blood and held a butcher knife while sitting in the dark and staring into a camera like I just got done slaughtering an entire family.
”
”
Navessa Allen (Lights Out (Into Darkness, #1))
“
The girl collected dry wood in her skirt as if happy to discover that skirts were good for something after all. He handed her the match safe and she started the fire in the little cookstove. With the butcher knife she expertly carved the bacon. She sang to herself. This was life as she knew it, and it was good. No roofs, no streets. Her new-washed taffy hair flew in loose ribbons in the morning breeze. Every so often she lifted her head to run her gaze over the live oaks around them and listen for an enemy presence. Then she went back to slinging rashers into the skillet.
”
”
Paulette Jiles (News of the World)
“
went into the kitchen, found the biggest butcher knife she could get her hands on and proceeded to plunge it into my little body not once, not twice, but eight times. The doctors said it was a miracle
”
”
Apryl Baker (The Ghost Files (The Ghost Files, #1))
“
When you get beef from the butcher, you don’t feel bad for the cow that has been killed. But if someone asked you to wield a knife and kill the cow yourself, you wouldn’t be able to do it.”
“Are you saying that you are a cow?”
“Exactly.”
“What?”
“You found me alive and couldn’t bring yourself to kill me. It would have been alright if the storm had finished me off. I am like that cow and the storm is the butcher. Do you see now?”
“Yes, I see. You absolutely insist that you are a cow. I am not arguing.
”
”
Anya Wylde (Penelope (Fairweather Sisters, #1))
“
I can snap open corsets faster than bones." He held his knife up, his attention fixed on my chest. "Interested in a demonstration, fancy lady? Say the word and I'll show you what else I can do with such a fine figure."
Liza stiffened beside me. People often called women of supposedly questionable morals "fancy ladies." If he thought I'd blush and run off, he was sorely mistaken.
"Unfortunately, sir, I find I'm not terribly impressed." I casually slipped a scalpel from my wristlet clutch, enjoying the familiar feel of it. "You see, I also eviscerate bodies. But I don't bother with animals. I butcher humans. Would you care for a demonstration?
”
”
Kerri Maniscalco (Capturing the Devil (Stalking Jack the Ripper, #4))
“
I’m guessing you made it your business too, judging by the quality of the hunting knife stuck in his throat. Handmade Damascus steel. Where’d you get it?” I sigh. My gaze lingers on the body and my favorite blade before I press my cheeks to my drawn-up knees. “Etsy.
”
”
Brynne Weaver (Butcher & Blackbird (The Ruinous Love Trilogy #1))
“
Louie's mother, Louise, took a different tack. Louie was a copy of herself, right down to the vivid blue eyes. When pushed, she shoved; sold a bad cut of meat, she'd march down to the butcher, frying pan in hand. Loving mischief, she spread icing over a cardboard box and presented it as a birthday cake to a neighbor, who promptly got the knife stuck. When Pete told her he'd drink his castor oil if she gave him an empty candy box. "You only asked for the box, honey," she said with a smile. "That's all I got." And she understood Louie's restiveness. One Halloween, she dressed as a boy and raced around town trick-or-treating with Louie and Pete. A gang of kids, thinking she was one of the local toughs, tackled her and tried to steal her pants. Little Louise Zamperini, mother of four, was deep in the melee when the cops picked her up for brawling.
”
”
Laura Hillenbrand (Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience and Redemption)
“
This is a bad idea,” Lula said to me. “My nipples are all shrunk up and trying to hide inside my body. It’s like what men’s gonads do when someone comes at them with a butcher knife. Those suckers abandon ship and there’s nothing left but an empty nut sack. Not that I know firsthand. I’m just sayin’ what I hear.
”
”
Janet Evanovich (Fortune and Glory: Tantalizing Twenty-Seven (Stephanie Plum, #27))
“
I follow behind her and watch as she takes a knife out of the butcher block and spins around, waving it wildly at me. “Let. Me. Leave.” Her voice is low and threatening, but it’s also trembling. “Put the knife down,” I plead. “I’ll put it down when I’m in the car.” I shake my head. “I can’t let you leave, Layla.” “You can’t make me stay!” she screams. “Why are you trying to make me stay?” She covers her mouth with her hand to stifle a sob, but she keeps the knife up, pointed in my direction. “Something is happening to us, Leeds. You’re going crazy. Or maybe it’s me, I don’t know, but it’s this house and we need to get out. Please.
”
”
Colleen Hoover (Layla)
“
Fortunately, all three assassins turned out to be excellent fighters. Tavin’s ability to explode eyeballs with a touch was especially impressive. It had definitely come in handy against a ten-foottall demon with butcher-knife-sized teeth and two dozen eyes.
Pop! Pop! Pop! Eyes everywhere. Some powers were meant for fun.
”
”
Larissa Ione (Reaver (Lords of Deliverance, #5; Demonica, #10))
“
Shirt off.”
Neil stared at her. “Why?”
“I can’t check track marks through cotton, Neil.”
“I don’t do drugs.”
“Good on you,” Abby said. “Keep it that way. Now take it off.”
[…] “I want to make this as painless as possible, but I can’t help you if you can’t help me. Tell me why you won’t take off your shirt.”
Neil looked for a delicate way to say it. The best he managed was, “I’m not okay.”
She put a finger to his chin and turned his face back toward her. “Neil, I work for the Foxes. None of you are okay. Chances are I’ve seen a lot worse than whatever it is you’re trying to hide from me.”
Neil’s smile was humorless. “I hope not.
“Trust me,” Abby said. “I’m not going to judge you. I’m here to help, remember? I’m your nurse now. That door is closed, and it comes with a lock. What happens in here stays in here.”
[…] “You can’t ask me about them,” he said at last. “I won’t talk to you about it. Okay?”
“Okay,” Abby agreed easily. “But know that when you want to, I’m here, and so is Betsy.”
Neil wasn’t going to tell that psychiatrist a thing, but he nodded. Abby dropped her hand and Neil pulled his shirt over his head before he could lose his nerve.
Abby thought she was ready. Neil knew she wouldn’t be, and he was right. Her mouth parted on a silent breath and her expression went blank. She wasn’t fast enough to hide her flinch, and Neil saw her shoulders go rigid with tension. He stared at her face as she stared at him, watching her gaze sweep over the brutal marks of a hideous childhood.
It started at the base of his throat, a looping scar curving down over his collarbone. A pucker with jagged edges was a finger-width away, courtesy of a bullet that hit him right on the edge of his Kevlar vest. A shapeless patch of pale skin from his left shoulder to his navel marked where he’d jumped out of a moving car and torn himself raw on the asphalt. Faded scars crisscrossed here and there from his life on the run, either from stupid accidents, desperate escapes, or conflicts with local lowlifes. Along his abdomen were larger overlapping lines from confrontations with his father’s people while on the run. His father wasn’t called the butcher for nothing; his weapon of choice was a cleaver. All of his men were well-versed in knife-fighting, and more than one of them had tried to stick Neil like a pig.
And there on his right shoulder was the perfect outline of half a hot iron. Neil didn’t remember what he’s said or done to irritate his father so much.
”
”
Nora Sakavic (The Foxhole Court (All for the Game, #1))
“
He looked at them and saw their faces did not fit. The skin on the skulls crawled and twitched like half-solid paste. All the heads in his angle of vision seemed irregular lumps, like potatoes but without a potato’s repose: potatoes with crawling surfaces punctured by holes which opened and shut, holes blocked with coloured jelly or fringed with bone stumps, elastic holes through which air was sucked or squirted, holes secreting salt, wax, spittle and snot. He grasped a pencil in his trouser pocket, wishing it were a knife he could thrust through his cheek and use to carve his face down to the clean bone. But that was foolish. Nothing clean lay under the face. He thought of sectioned brains, palettes, eyeballs and ears seen in medical diagrams and butcher’s shops. He thought of elastic muscle, pulsing tubes, gland sacks full of lukewarm fluid, the layers of cellular and fibrous and granular tissues inside a head. What was felt as tastes, caresses, dreams and thoughts could be seen as a cleverly articulated mass of garbage.
”
”
Alasdair Gray (Lanark)
“
To create a kind of balance between a butcher and a sheep, you either take the knife from the butcher or teach the sheep how to use a knife!
”
”
Mehmet Murat ildan
“
I used the knife. I saved a child. I won a war. God forgive me.
”
”
Jim Butcher (Changes (The Dresden Files, #12))
“
he had nothing to give, except maybe Mein Kampf, and there was no way he'd give such propaganda to a young German girl. That would be like the lamb handing a knife to the butcher.
”
”
Markus Zusak (The Book Thief)
“
God was the righting of wrongs by any means necessary. God was vengeance. God was a woman with a butcher's knife.
”
”
Jessica Gadziala (The Rise of Ferryn)
“
Second of all, those fairy tales that you hear over and over and over again aren't even the REAL fairy tales. Has your teacher ever said to you, "Today, children, we're going to read a Cinderella story where the stepsisters cut off their toes and their heels with a butcher's knife! And then they get their eyes pecked out by birds! Ready? Is everyone sitting crisscross-applesauce?
”
”
Adam Gidwitz (In a Glass Grimmly (A Tale Dark & Grimm, #2))
“
What are the butcherly delights of meat? These are not sensual but analytical. The satisfaction of scientific curiosity in dissection. A clinical pleasure in the precision with which the process of reducing the living, moving, vivid object to the dead status of thing is accomplished. The pleasure of watching the spectacle of the slaughter that derives from the knowledge one is disassociated from the spectacle; the bloody excitation of the audience in the abattoir, who watch the dramatic transformation act, from living flesh to dead meat, derives from the knowledge they are safe from the knife themselves. There is the technical pleasure of carving and the anticipatory pleasure of the prospect of eating the meat, of the assimilation of the dead stuff, after which it will be humanly transformed into flesh.
”
”
Angela Carter (The Sadeian Woman: And the Ideology of Pornography)
“
I pictured the flesh hanging from her bones like cold flanks of pork swinging from hooks at a butcher shop—thick, clammy, orange-hued fat, meat tough and bloodless and cold when the knife hacked through it.
”
”
Ottessa Moshfegh (Eileen)
“
My father died in 1912, of a heart b-blockage.” It was a kind of blockage, getting stuck in the heart with a butcher knife wielded by a cuckolded husband. “My mother didn’t like the rumbling from Germany, and decided to bring me to London.” To escape the scandal, not the Boche. “She died of influenza last year, God rest her soul.” Bitter, vulgar, and haranguing to the end, flinging teacups at Eve and swearing.
”
”
Kate Quinn (The Alice Network)
“
Freedom is like a man who kills himself Each night, an incessant butcher, whose knife Grows sharp in blood. The armies kill themselves, And in their blood an ancient evil dies— The action of incorrigible tragedy.
”
”
Wallace Stevens (The Collected Poems of Wallace Stevens (Vintage International))
“
Like a butcher without a knife, a knight without a sword, and a farrier without a hammer, you cannot have a town without rules; if there were a town like that, a great big anarchy would reign there, just as in the realm of animals!
”
”
Mehmet Murat ildan (William Shakespeare)
“
You hwill follow me!” You did not disobey someone who added h’s to their w’s. Clara and Nutcracker hurried after Mother Svetlana, who could glide down the hall with extreme grace for someone her size. Nuns rushed past them in frocks of beige, their starched wimples brushing Clara. Mother Svetlana parted them like the Red Sea. Something flashed in one of their hands—a butcher knife? “How dare these ungodly creatures assault a house of the Lord!” Mother Svetlana’s voice filled to the arches. “Hwe are hwomen of peace!” “Yes…” Nutcracker eyed a short nun who scampered past with an ax. She looked positively gleeful. “Hwe hwill hold the rats off, with God’s help,” Mother Svetlana continued. Down the hall, gunshots sounded, echoing through the gardens. A nun rushed past, carrying an eye-stinging bucket of lye. Another feeble old woman scuttled past with a huge rifle, gleefully squeaking: Lawks, lawks, I’m just a little old nun!
”
”
Heather Dixon Wallwork (The Enchanted Sonata)
“
Anyone who has ever tried to write a novel knows what an arduous task it is, undoubtedly one of the worst ways of occupying oneself. You have to remain within yourself all the time, in solitary confinement. It’s a controlled psychosis, an obsessive paranoia manacled to work, completely lacking in the feather pens and bustles and Venetian masks we would ordinarily associate with it, clothed instead in a butcher’s apron and rubber boots, eviscerating knife in hand.
”
”
Olga Tokarczuk (Flights)
“
This is a gift, Helena, not a curse. You can help
them,” Minerva said.
“I’m afraid of them,” Helena replied, blunt as a butcher’s
knife.
“And they sense that, and they think they can take
your place,” Minerva replied, matching Helena’s tone.
”
”
Claire L. Smith (Helena)
“
As tight as it had been in the kitchen before they’d left, there were three times as many people crammed in there now, most of them men. Beverly’s mother was nowhere in sight and neither was the baby. Beverly was standing at the sink, a butcher’s knife in her hand. She was slicing oranges from an enormous pile that was sliding across the counter while the two lawyers from the L.A. County District Attorney’s Office, Dick Spencer and Albert Cousins—suit jackets off, ties off, and shirtsleeves rolled up high above the elbow—were twisting the halves of oranges on two metal juicers. Their foreheads were flushed and damp with sweat, their opened collars just beginning to darken, they worked as if the safety of their city relied on the making of orange juice.
”
”
Ann Patchett (Commonwealth)
“
Furious grief for her sorrow gripped him in claws of steel. She was young, close to his age, yet she'd seen so much unhappiness. He'd give his soul to ease her pain. But his soul, he knew to his regret, held no value for her.
He clenched his fists at his side as he watched her raise her hands to her face. He didn't need to be close to her to know the tears that had threatened during her tale finally overflowed.
Jesus, he hated it when she cried. Every tear ripped at his heart like a blunt butcher's knife.
”
”
Anna Campbell (Untouched)
“
No one was standing in the shadows smoking a cigarette or looking about with a shifty-eyed gaze. I couldn’t see anyone quickly hiding a bloody knife behind his back or twirling a moustache, either. That ruled out the Dudley Do-Right approach to finding the killer.
”
”
Jim Butcher (The Dresden Files Books 1-6)
“
Plus, I was still pining over poor, deceased, Quarterback-Chris. Just kidding! Quarterback-Chris had apparently been less than faithful to me during our two year relationship and after things with the government, army and general world went to hell, Quarterback-Chris tried to eat me! So I did what any loving, devoted girlfriend that just found out she had been serially cheated on by her now zombie boyfriend would do. I plunged a butcher knife into his eye socket and when that didn’t effectively do the job, I drove over him with my mom’s Escalade until his head detached from his body.
”
”
Rachel Higginson (Love and Decay, Volume One (Love and Decay #1-6))
“
For the first time that day, he thought about the men who abandoned him. His rage grew as he stared at the doe. Abandonment seemed too benign to describe their treachery. Abandonment was a passive act—running away or leaving something behind. If his keepers had done no more than abandon him, he would at this moment be sighting down the barrel of his gun, about to shoot the deer. He would be using his knife to butcher the animal, and sparking his flint against steel to start a fire and cook it. He looked down at himself, wet from head to toe, wounded, reeking from the skunk, the bitter taste of roots still in his mouth. What
”
”
Michael Punke (The Revenant (Peter Decker and Rina Lazarus))
“
When a plate was put in front of him, he glanced up. “No veggies? Not that I’m looking a gift horse in the mouth.” “Vegetable matter is a waste of porcelain space.” Phury pushed a knife and fork across the butcher block. “Ask yourself, would I sacrifice the surface area of mashed or stuffing for peas?” “I love you.
”
”
J.R. Ward (The Thief (Black Dagger Brotherhood, #16))
“
Is cooking dangerous?"
Most would answer no. But what is a gas range but a short - range flame thrower? Any number of flammable materials might lie waiting beneath the average kitchen sink. Shelves lined with pots could weaken and fall in an avalanche of iron and steel. A butcher's knife could kill as easily as a dagger.
Yet few people would consider cooking a dangerous profession, and indeed, the actual danger is remote. Anyone who has spent any time in a kitchen is familiar with the inherent risks, such as they are, and knows what can be done safely and what can't. Never throw water on an oil fire, keep the knife pointed away from your carotid artery, don't use rat poison when the recipe calls for
parmesan cheese.
”
”
Hiroshi Sakurazaka (All You Need Is Kill)
“
I fear the democratization of plastic surgery, when it's so cheap that everyone - the butcher, the baker, and the candlestick maker - goes under the knife and winds up looking like these tightly pulled, slightly surprised-looking society and celebrity aliens from Planet Botox. . . . When I was young, I could have bottled up my self-loathing and filled a mile of train cars with it. Now that I'm old, I can't think of anyone I'd rather be than me. . . . That's what we need now: surgeons who can slice away the self-consciousness, the fear, the loneliness, and inject a little hope instead. A little love. Or a doctor who implants only high spirits, penchants for practical jokes, or the ability to cha-cha even to a dirge beat.
”
”
Lorna Landvik (Oh My Stars)
“
Many displayed in their nudity traces of their past: scars of knife thrusts in the belly, starbursts of guns hot wounds, ridges of the razor cuts of love, Caesarean sections sewn up by butchers. Some of them had their young children with them during the day, those unfortunate fruits of youthful defiance or carelessness, and they took off their children’s clothes as soon as they were brought in so they would not feel different in that paradise of nudity.
”
”
Gabriel García Márquez (Love in the Time of Cholera)
“
As Harry marveled, the Cenobite continued his brutal effort of making new adjustments to his own flesh so as to fit the Devil’s suit: first a slice off his other hip, down to the red meat; then up to his arms, slicing away the flesh at the back of his triceps; and passing the knife from left hand to right and back again, cutting effortlessly with either. The area around his feet looked like the floor of a butcher’s store. Cobs and slices of fatty meat were scattered everywhere.
”
”
Clive Barker (The Scarlet Gospels)
“
Hans?” Thomas asked. “You still can’t find him?”
“I am here,” Boris said.
“Oh. Why do you have Hans’s phone?”
“He gave it to me in exchange for a blow job.”
Hans gasped. “I did not!”
Thomas laughed. “What’s going on?”
“Hans tells me I will get sunburned,” Boris said, “so I should put on this nasty-smelling coconut shit. But I cannot reach my back—I am not a comic book character—and he will not put it on me.”
“You’re sunbathing? Since when do you sunbathe?”
Boris made a rude noise. “That is beside the point. I need you to tell Hans you won’t divorce me and come after him with a butcher knife if he rubs coconut shit on my back.”
“You two will be the death of me,” Thomas muttered, but there was a note of affection in his voice. Hans assumed that was for Boris, but the way Thomas had said “you two” sounded as if they were all somehow together. Hans was surprised by how much he liked that. “Hans, I won’t divorce Boris and come after you with a butcher knife if you rub coconut shit on his back.”
“Thank you,” Boris told him
”
”
Jamie Fessenden (The Rules)
“
Suddenly with a single bound he leaped into the room. Winning a way past us before any of us could raise a hand to stay him. There was something so pantherlike in the movement, something so unhuman, that it seemed to sober us all from the shock of his coming. The first to act was Harker, who with a quick movement, threw himself before the door leading into the room in the front of the house. As the Count saw us, a horrible sort of snarl passed over his face, showing the eyeteeth long and pointed. But the evil smile as quickly passed into a cold stare of lion-like disdain. His expression again changed as, with a single impulse, we all advanced upon him. It was a pity that we had not some better organized plan of attack, for even at the moment I wondered what we were to do. I did not myself know whether our lethal weapons would avail us anything. Harker evidently meant to try the matter, for he had ready his great Kukri knife and made a fierce and sudden cut at him. The blow was a powerful one; only the diabolical quickness of the Count's leap back saved him. A second less and the trenchant blade had shorn through his heart. As it was, the point just cut the cloth of his coat, making a wide gap whence a bundle of bank notes and a stream of gold fell out. The expression of the Count's face was so hellish, that for a moment I feared for Harker, though I saw him throw the terrible knife aloft again for another stroke. Instinctively I moved forward with a protective impulse, holding the Crucifix and Wafer in my left hand. I felt a mighty power fly along my arm, and it was without surprise that I saw the monster cower back before a similar movement made spontaneously by each one of us. It would be impossible to describe the expression of hate and baffled malignity, of anger and hellish rage, which came over the Count's face. His waxen hue became greenish-yellow by the contrast of his burning eyes, and the red scar on the forehead showed on the pallid skin like a palpitating wound. The next instant, with a sinuous dive he swept under Harker's arm, ere his blow could fall, and grasping a handful of the money from the floor, dashed across the room, threw himself at the window. Amid the crash and glitter of the falling glass, he tumbled into the flagged area below. Through the sound of the shivering glass I could hear the "ting" of the gold, as some of the sovereigns fell on the flagging. We ran over and saw him spring unhurt from the ground. He, rushing up the steps, crossed the flagged yard, and pushed open the stable door. There he turned and spoke to us. "You think to baffle me, you with your pale faces all in a row, like sheep in a butcher's. You shall be sorry yet, each one of you! You think you have left me without a place to rest, but I have more. My revenge is just begun! I spread it over centuries, and time is on my side. Your girls that you all love are mine already. And through them you and others shall yet be mine, my creatures, to do my bidding and to be my jackals when I want to feed. Bah!" With a contemptuous sneer, he passed quickly through the door, and we heard the rusty bolt creak as he fastened it behind him. A door beyond opened and shut. The first of us to speak was the Professor. Realizing the difficulty of following him through the stable, we moved toward the hall. "We have learnt something… much! Notwithstanding his brave words, he fears us. He fears time, he fears want! For if not, why he hurry so? His very tone betray him, or my ears deceive. Why take that money? You follow quick. You are hunters of the wild beast, and understand it so. For me, I make sure that nothing here may be of use to him, if so that he returns.
”
”
Bram Stoker (Dracula)
“
He seasoned the chicken with salt, pepper and mustard, and then grilled it to absolute perfection in clarified butter! The light coating of panko is toasted to a beautiful golden brown. Its crunch delightfully highlights the chicken's tender juiciness.
"But what takes this dish's flavor and elevates it to a whole other level... are the tiny crumbles of Boudin Noir blood sausage you added during the grilling step!"
"That's right! The Poussin Chicken had just been butchered, so I took a little of its blood and mixed it with some pork blood... to whip up my own special blood sausage! That gave the dish some real punch, don'tcha think?"
"B-but that shouldn't even work!
Blood sausage has such a powerful flavor it should have overwhelmed the more delicate Poussin Chicken...
but that chicken flavor is still undeniably the centerpiece of this dish!"
"That's from the fat. See, I didn't just grab some of the chicken's blood. I siphoned up some of its fat too. With this special injector here."
Animal fat is just as jam-packed with richness and body as blood! A little dollop of that keeps the chicken balanced as the center of the dish while deepening its overall flavor!
Not only that, he used the chain carving knife to add innumerable delicate hidden cuts in the chicken. Thanks to those, the flavors of the chicken, the sausage and the sauce all meld together seamlessly, creating a cohesive overall experience.
”
”
Yūto Tsukuda (食戟のソーマ 34 [Shokugeki no Souma 34] (Food Wars: Shokugeki no Soma, #34))
“
Lord Stannis had rewarded Davos with choice lands on Cape Wrath, a small keep, and a knight’s honors … but he had also decreed that he lose a joint of each finger on his left hand, to pay for all his years of smuggling. Davos had submitted, on the condition that Stannis wield the knife himself; he would accept no punishment from lesser hands. The lord had used a butcher’s cleaver, the better to cut clean and true. Afterwards, Davos had chosen the name Seaworth for his new-made house, and he took for his banner a black ship on a pale grey field—with an onion on its sails. The one-time smuggler was fond of saying that Lord Stannis had done him a boon, by giving him four less fingernails to clean and trim.
”
”
George R.R. Martin (A Clash of Kings (A Song of Ice and Fire, #2))
“
That accounts for his crying so. Poor creature!”
”Well--you must do the sticking--there's no help for it. I'll showyou how. Or I'll do it myself--I think I could. Though as it issuch a big pig I had rather Challow had done it. However, his basketo' knives and things have been already sent on here, and we can use'em.”
”Of course you shan't do it,” said Jude. ”I'll do it, since it mustbe done.”
He went out to the sty, shovelled away the snow for the space of acouple of yards or more, and placed the stool in front, with theknives and ropes at hand. A robin peered down at the preparationsfrom the nearest tree, and, not liking the sinister look of thescene, flew away, though hungry. By this time Arabella had joinedher husband, and Jude, rope in hand, got into the sty, and noosed theaffrighted animal, who, beginning with a squeak of surprise, rose torepeated cries of rage. Arabella opened the sty-door, and togetherthey hoisted the victim on to the stool, legs upward, and while Judeheld him Arabella bound him down, looping the cord over his legs tokeep him from struggling.
The animal's note changed its quality. It was not now rage, but thecry of despair; long-drawn, slow and hopeless.
”Upon my soul I would sooner have gone without the pig than have hadthis to do!” said Jude. ”A creature I have fed with my own hands.”
”Don't be such a tender-hearted fool! There's the sticking-knife--the one with the point. Now whatever you do, don't stick un toodeep.”
”I'll stick him effectually, so as to make short work of it. That'sthe chief thing.”
”You must not!” she cried. ”The meat must be well bled, and to dothat he must die slow. We shall lose a shilling a score if the meatis red and bloody! Just touch the vein, that's all. I was broughtup to it, and I know. Every good butcher keeps un bleeding long.He ought to be eight or ten minutes dying, at least.”
”He shall not be half a minute if I can help it, however the meat maylook,” said Jude determinedly. Scraping the bristles from the pig'supturned throat, as he had seen the butchers do, he slit the fat;then plunged in the knife with all his might.
”'Od damn it all!” she cried, ”that ever I should say it! You'veover-stuck un! And I telling you all the time--”
”Do be quiet, Arabella, and have a little pity on the creature!
”
”
Thomas Hardy (Jude the Obscure)
“
The temperature was in the nineties, and on hot nights Chicagoans feel the city body and soul. The stockyards are gone, Chicago is no longer slaughter-city, but the old smells revive in the night heat. Miles of railroad siding along the streets once were filled with red cattle cars, the animals waiting to enter the yards lowing and reeking. The old stink still haunts the place. It returns at times, suspiring from the vacated soil, to remind us all that Chicago had once led the world in butcher-technology and that billions of animals had died here. And that night the windows were open wide and the familiar depressing multilayered stink of meat, tallow, blood-meal, pulverized bones, hides, soap, smoked slabs, and burnt hair came back. Old Chicago breathed again through leaves and screens. I heard fire trucks and the gulp and whoop of ambulances, bowel-deep and hysterical. In the surrounding black slums incendiarism shoots up in summer, an index, some say, of psychopathology. Although the love of flames is also religious. However, Denise was sitting nude on the bed rapidly and strongly brushing her hair. Over the lake, steel mills twinkled. Lamplight showed the soot already fallen on the leaves of the wall ivy. We had an early drought that year. Chicago, this night, was panting, the big urban engines going, tenements blazing in Oakwood with great shawls of flame, the sirens weirdly yelping, the fire engines, ambulances, and police cars – mad-dog, gashing-knife weather, a rape and murder night, thousands of hydrants open, spraying water from both breasts.
”
”
Saul Bellow (Humboldt's Gift)
“
As it turned out, the two decades immediately following the popularization of anesthesia saw surgical outcomes worsen. With their newfound confidence about operating without inflicting pain, surgeons became ever more willing to take up the knife, driving up the incidences of postoperative infection and shock. Operating theaters became filthier than ever as the number of surgeries increased. Surgeons still lacking an understanding of the causes of infection would operate on multiple patients in succession using the same unwashed instruments on each occasion. The more crowded the operating theater became, the less likely it was that even the most primitive sanitary precautions would be taken. Of those who went under the knife, many either died or never fully recovered and then spent the rest of their lives as invalids. This problem was universal. Patients worldwide came to further dread the word “hospital,” while the most skilled surgeons distrusted their own abilities.
”
”
Lindsey Fitzharris (The Butchering Art: Joseph Lister's Quest to Transform the Grisly World of Victorian Medicine)
“
There is a method for it: ten men are required. The sergeant surgeon with his instrument; the sergeant of the wood-yard with mallet and block. The master cook, who brings the butcher's knife; the sergeant of the larder, who knows how meat should be cut; the sergeant ferrer with irons to sear the wound; the yeoman from the chandlery, with waxed cloths; the yeoman of the scullery with a dish of coals to heat the searing iron, a chafing dish to cool them; the sergeant of the cellar with wine and ale; the sergeant of the ewery with basin and towels. And the sergeant of the poultry, with a cock, its legs strung, struggling and squawking as he holds it against the block and strikes off its head.
When the fowl has been sacrificed the right arm of the offender is bared. His forearm is laid down. The butcher fits the blade to the joint. A prayer is said. Then the sword hand is severed, the veins are seared, and the body of the collapsed offender is rolled onto a cloth and carried away.
”
”
Hilary Mantel (The Mirror & the Light (Thomas Cromwell, #3))
“
It was said of Liston by his colleagues that when he amputated, “the gleam of his knife was followed so instantaneously by the sound of sawing as to make the two actions appear almost simultaneous.” His left arm was reportedly so strong that he could use it as a tourniquet, while he wielded the knife in his right hand. This was a feat that required immense strength and dexterity, given that patients often struggled against the fear and agony of the surgeon’s assault. Liston could remove a leg in less than thirty seconds, and in order to keep both hands free, he often clasped the bloody knife between his teeth while working. Liston’s speed was both a gift and a curse. Once, he accidentally sliced off a patient’s testicle along with the leg he was amputating. His most famous (and possibly apocryphal) mishap involved an operation during which he worked so rapidly that he took off three of his assistant’s fingers and, while switching blades, slashed a spectator’s coat. Both the assistant and the patient died later of gangrene, and the unfortunate bystander expired on the spot from fright. It is the only surgery in history said to have had a 300 percent fatality rate.
”
”
Lindsey Fitzharris (The Butchering Art: Joseph Lister's Quest to Transform the Grisly World of Victorian Medicine)
“
You fought well on Mona, my Mules, but I have brought you here for a little more javelin practice.’ The words carried along the line and Valerius could see men grinning at the unlikely familiarity. ‘Those who stand before you have murdered, tortured and raped Roman citizens, men, women and children; innocents whose only crime was to attempt to bring civilization to this land. They butchered and mutilated your comrades of the Ninth, and the brave veterans of Colonia who fell defending the Temple of Divine Claudius.’ He paused and the silence was filled by a growl, like an enormous dog gathering itself for the attack. ‘We offered them our friendship, our trust and our aid, and they took all with smiles of thanks, but when we turned our backs they reached for the knife and the sword and the spear, as is their way. They believe you are already defeated.’ ‘No!’ The massed roar carried across the valley and echoed from the banks. ‘They are the true face of barbarism. They are your enemy. They show no mercy and they deserve no mercy. Give them none. For Rome!’
‘For Rome!’ The words erupted from ten thousand throats and Valerius felt the ice in his belly melt and the first stirrings of life return to his heart.
‘For Rome,’ he whispered.
”
”
Douglas Jackson (Hero of Rome (Gaius Valerius Verrens, #1))
“
The Sandwich Maker would pass what he had made to his assistant who would then add a few slices of newcumber and fladish and a touch of splagberry sauce, and then apply the topmost layer of bread and cut the sandwich with a fourth and altogether plainer knife. It was not that these were not also skilful operations, but they were lesser skills to be performed by a dedicated apprentice who would one day, when the Sandwich Maker finally laid down his tools, take over from him. It was an exalted position and that apprentice, Drimple, was the envy of his fellows. There were those in the village who were happy chopping wood, those who were content carrying water, but to be the Sandwich Maker was very heaven.
And so the Sandwich Maker sang as he worked.
He was using the last of the year’s salted meat. It was a little past its best now, but still the rich savour of Perfectly Normal Beast meat was something unsurpassed in any of the Sandwich Maker’s previous experience. Next week it was anticipated that the Perfectly Normal Beasts would appear again for their regular migration, whereupon the whole village would once again be plunged into frenetic action: hunting the Beasts, killing perhaps six, maybe even seven dozen of the thousands that thundered past. Then the Beasts must be rapidly butchered and cleaned, with most of the meat salted to keep it through the winter months until the return migration in the spring, which would replenish their supplies.
The very best of the meat would be roasted straight away for the feast that marked the Autumn Passage. The celebrations would last for three days of sheer exuberance, dancing and stories that Old Thrashbarg would tell of how the hunt had gone, stories that he would have been busy sitting making up in his hut while the rest of the village was out doing the actual hunting.
And then the very, very best of the meat would be saved from the feast and delivered cold to the Sandwich Maker. And the Sandwich Maker would exercise on it the skills that he had brought to them from the gods, and make the exquisite Sandwiches of the Third Season, of which the whole village would partake before beginning, the next day, to prepare themselves for the rigours of the coming winter.
Today he was just making ordinary sandwiches, if such delicacies, so lovingly crafted, could ever be called ordinary. Today his assistant was away so the Sandwich Maker was applying his own garnish, which he was happy to do. He was happy with just about everything in fact.
”
”
Douglas Adams (Mostly Harmless (Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, #5))
“
The SWAT team leader didn't like us cutting up the body. He and Ramirez went into a yelling match.
While everyone was watching the argument, I nodded to Olaf and he beheaded the corpse in one blow. Blood gushed out onto the cave floor.
"What the fuck are you doing?" one of the SWAT cops asked, bringing his gun pointed at us.
"My job," I said. I put the tip of the blade under the ribs.
The policeman brought the gun up to his shoulder. "Get away from the body until the captain tells you it's okay to do it."
I kept the knife against the body. "Olaf."
"Yes."
"If he shoots me, kill him."
"My pleasure." The big man turned his eyes to the policeman, and there was something in that gaze that made the heavily armed man take a step back.
I plunged the blade into the skin, and it slid home. I cut a hole just below his ribs and reached into the hole. It was tight and wet and slick, and it took two hands to get the heart out, one to cut it free of the connecting tissue, and one to hold onto it. I drew it from the chest, blood stained to my elbows.
I caught Ramirez and Bernardo both looking at me, with nearly identical looks on their faces. I didn't think either of them would be wanting a date any time soon. They'd always remember watching me cut a man's heart out, and that memory would stain anything else. With Bernardo, I didn't give a shit. With Ramirez, it hurt to see that look in his eyes.
A hand touched the heart. I stared at that hand, then looked up to meet Olaf's eyes. He wasn't repulsed. He stroked the heart, hands sliding over mine. I pulled away, and we looked at each other over the body we'd butchered. No, Olaf wasn't repulsed. The look in his eyes was that pure darkness that only fills a man's eyes in the most intimate of situations. He raised the severed head up by the hair and held it almost as if he'd let me kiss it. Then I realized he was holding it over the heart, like a matched pair.
I had to turn away from what I saw in his face.
”
”
Laurell K. Hamilton (Obsidian Butterfly (Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter, #9))
“
He ended up coming back to her. For different reasons they went into a butcher's shop. For her the smell of raw meat was a perfume that levitated her as if she’d eaten As for him, what he wanted to see was the butcher and his sharp knife. He envied the butcher and wanted to be one himself. Sticking a knife into meat turned him on. Both left the butcher’s satisfied. Though she wondered: what would the meat taste like? And he wondered: how do you get to be a butcher. What was their secret?
”
”
Clarice Lispector
“
Fine’s a funny word, don’t you think? I don’t think there’s another like it in the English language that says so much while actually saying so little. How many wives have told their husbands, “I’m fine,” when they really mean, “I want to cut your balls off with a butcher knife?” How many men have told their girlfriends, “You look fine,” when they really mean, “You need to go back to the gym and work out – a lot.” It’s the universal way of saying we’re just peachy – when we’re really anything but.
”
”
Emma Chase (Tangled (Tangled, #1))
“
For the first time in my life, I was going to do the right thing, and I wished it felt better, because the truth was, it felt like fucking shit. It felt like hell, like torture, like a sharp butcher’s knife digging into my chest, piercing into my heart and pulling it out slowly, breaking each and every one of my ribs on its way out.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Sparrow (Boston Belles, #0.5))
“
That was me. I was The Fixer.
Everything was fixed.
Well, other than what was important.
I walked down the hallway of the hospital like I was on death row. I wasn’t scared, I was petrified.
For the first time in my life, I was going to do the right thing, and I wished it felt better, because the truth was, it felt like fucking shit.
It felt like hell, like torture, like a sharp butcher’s knife digging into my chest, piercing into my heart and pulling it out slowly, breaking each and every one of my ribs on its way out.
Every door I passed brought me closer to the door I didn’t want to knock on.
”
”
L.J. Shen (Sparrow (Boston Belles, #0.5))
“
I’ll go with you,” Scarlet said as she followed after Heather. “I don’t want you to be alone.”
“Scarlet?” Gabriel said, and Scarlet turned around. “Uh…do you maybe want to let me hold on to the knife?” He glanced at the bloody butcher knife in her hand that she had retrieved from the pile of ashes left by the Ashman in the old graveyard. “You know, just so you don’t scare the townspeople?”
Scarlet looked down at her weapon as she handed it to Gabriel.
It was probably better for Scarlet not to prance into the fair with a bloodstained weapon. Small town folks tended to get gossipy about stuff like that.
”
”
Chelsea Fine (Awry (The Archers of Avalon, #2))
“
It’s like a knife wound, but bigger.” “That’s probably because it was done with something like a knife, but bigger.” “A sword? You've got to be kidding me.
”
”
Jim Butcher
“
What did you say?” Henry grated.
“I said shut up, Henry.” Rachel’s voice was still soft, but the glint in her eyes was fighting mean. “I’ve put up with your cussedness for nigh on nine years. No more. You apologize to Loretta Jane this instant.”
“Or you’ll do what?”
Rachel lifted a challenging brow. “Well, I reckon you’re too big for me to grab you by the heels and bash your brains. Guess I’ll have to blow them out. Now apologize. I won’t have that kind of talk in my house.”
“Your house?”
“That’s right.”
Henry did an admirable job of trying to appear amused. Placing his hands on his hips, he bent one knee and eyed the rifle. “Rachel, darlin’, you have a gun right now. Here shortly, you’re gonna have to put it down and cook. And when you do, I’m gonna beat the sass plumb out of you. Now I suggest you be the one to apologize. If you do it convincin’ enough, maybe I’ll forgit this ever happened.”
Loretta figured the bluff would probably work. Aunt Rachel had never been long on guts, and Loretta didn’t see her getting a goodly supply in the space of ten minutes. Rachel surprised her, though. Instead of apologizing, she set her jaw and raised her chin.
“Henry, if you touch me when I’m cookin’, I’ll rip you from stem to bow with my butcher knife. I’ve had it up to my gullet with you.”
“Give me that gun!” Henry stomped toward her.
Rachel took quick aim. The explosion of noise nearly scared Loretta out of her skin. Henry jumped straight up, clearing the floor by several inches.
“Holy Mother, you near shot my foot off, you damned fool woman!”
“Next time, I won’t miss.”
Henry sputtered, so mad he looked fit to bust. “Rachel, I swear, I’ll give you the hidin’ of your life for this.”
“Touch her, Uncle Henry, and I’ll knock you senseless with a chunk of firewood,” Loretta inserted.
“And if she don’t do a good job of it, I’ll finish it for her!” Amy yelled from the loft ladder. “Good for you, Ma! Give the old wart toad what for!”
Rachel returned the Spencer to the rack. “Well, Henry? It sounds like three to one. You gonna apologize to Loretta Jane or not?
”
”
Catherine Anderson (Comanche Moon (Comanche, #1))
“
Six horses waited, adorned in the red and black of the Company of Cooks and harnessed to an open, canopied wagon festooned with ribbons. Upon it lay Bartolomeo's casket, draped with a cloth embroidered with the company's coat of arms. A bear was on the left side of the crest and a stag on the right. Below the central chevron and its two red stars were the tools of the company's trade, a crossed knife and a butcher's knife. The banner beneath bore a Latin phrase coined by Horace- ab ovo usque ad mala- embroidered in gold. From eggs to apples, beginning to end. Roman meals had always begun with eggs and ended with fruit.
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Crystal King (The Chef's Secret)
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cup flour and ¼ cup warm water. 2.Over time, the starter may develop a brown liquid on top. Before you use the starter again, pour off the brown liquid and remove ¼ cup of starter. Discard both. 3.Make sure you feed your starter each day before baking to strengthen and revive the starter. 4.If you bake frequently and want to keep the starter going, you can add water and flour daily or even twice a day. 5.Always make sure to add equal parts warm water and flour. You don’t have to stick to a ¼ cup. You can use as little as a tablespoon in equal amounts or as much as a cup of each. SIMPLE SOURDOUGH BREAD Now that you have a simple starter, let’s make some sourdough. Before you begin, you need to know some differences between sourdough and traditional bread. Unlike traditional bread, sourdough needs to be prepared a day in advance. The dough won’t double in size in an hour like some traditional breads. And there’s a chance you won’t be successful on your first (or second) try. But with tenacity and practice, you’ll be making mouthwatering artisanal loaves in no time. PREP: 1–3 days COOK: 45–60 minutes COOL: 30 minutes 1 cup sourdough starter (preferably fed 3 hours before) 3 – 4 cups flour 1 ½ cups warm water 2 teaspoons salt Optional: 1 tablespoon olive oil DIRECTIONS 1.Mix bubbly sourdough starter with 1½ cups flour and 1 cup water in a bowl and whisk until the dough looks like batter. 2.Add salt and remaining flour. When you can no longer whisk, use your hands. Rather than knead the dough, practice folding it. Simply take dough from one side, stretch it up, and fold it on top. Repeat for each side of the dough. Continue to add flour until the texture is sticky and still pourable. 3.Pour dough into loaf or pie pans until ⅓ full. Cover and allow to rest at room temperature for 8–12 hours or until double in size with a dome on the top. 4.Take a sharp serrated knife and slice the top of the loaves into a square. 5.Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Place your dough in the refrigerator to stabilize it while the oven preheats. 6.Bake bread for 45–60 minutes until the edges turn golden. If you prefer your bread browner, brush olive oil on top ten minutes before removing from oven. When you tap on the loaves, they should sound hollow. 7.Remove and allow to cool on wire racks. Makes 2 loaves.
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Margaret Feinberg (Taste and See: Discovering God among Butchers, Bakers, and Fresh Food Makers)
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The Butcher appeared with four of the toughest Tonto Macoute plus the Anteater, also known as Hormigonera, or the Kid Sniffer. She was rumoured to have been brought up by wolves and had the longest nose in all of Balaal. She was semi-feral and would be paid only in raw meat.
Like most of Balaal’s population, she was of an unknown age. Her limbs were stick-thin and she had a limp from where a child had stabbed her with a knife, but she possessed a great, distended belly from all the meat she had consumed, and her face was as smooth as a peach save for two vertical lines between her eyebrows. She wore a washerwoman’s rags and a pair of runner chinelos, from which her fat, filthy toes protruded like slugs.
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J.J. Amaworo Wilson (Nazare)
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When a burglar came to my house I was tempted to reach for the butcher knife in the kitchen, but instead I grabbed the 571 Banana Slicer. I told the burglar, “I’m gonna slice your nanner,” and he ran in a terrible fright. Thank you 571 Banana Slicer for saving my home and possibly my life.
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Amazon Reviewers (Did You Read That Review?: A Compilation of Amazon's Funniest Reviews)
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And I . . . I used the knife. I saved a child. I won a war. God forgive me.
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Jim Butcher (Changes (The Dresden Files, #12))
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Better to be the clown with the butcher's knife than the mourning man with a target on his back.
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Caroline Peckham (The Death Club (Dead Men Walking, #1))
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TRUE STORIES
Don't ask for the true story;
why do you need it?
It's not what I set out with
or what I carry.
What I'm sailing with,
a knife, blue fire,
luck, a few good words
that still work and the tide.
The true story was lost
on the way down to the beach, it's something
I never had, that black tangle
of branches in a shifting light,
my blurred footprints
filling with salt
water, this handful
of tiny bones, this owl's kill.
a moon, crumpled papers, a coin,
the glint of an old picnic,
the hollows made by lovers
in the sand a hundred
years ago: no clue
The true story lies
among the other stories;
a mess of colors, like jumbled clothing,
thrown off or away,
like hearts on marble, like syllables like
butchers' discards.
The true story is vicious
and multiple and untrue
after all. Why do you
need it? Don't ever
ask for the true story.
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Margaret Atwood (Eating Fire : Selected Poetry, 1965-95)
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The killer’s got a chainsaw/boat hook/butcher’s knife and this girl’s got zip: no upper body strength, no mass, no shotgun. All she’s got is good cardio and an all-American face. Yet somehow she kills the killer, then stares numbly off into the middle distance, or collapses into the arms of the arriving police, or runs crying to her boyfriend, makes one last quip, lights one last cigarette, asks a final haunting question, gets taken off in an ambulance screaming and screaming like she’s never going to stop. Ever wonder what happens to those final girls?
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Grady Hendrix (The Final Girl Support Group)
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Fucking. Whores. Just like the woman who carved me up with a butcher knife.
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Lauren Biel (Driving My Obsession (Ride or Die Romances))
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The why’s twofold. Intertwined and simultaneous. The first why is that Yann the man is evil. He claims ownership of the tools and the fruits of other people’s work and smashes those who ask for scraps beneath his heel. His actions stain the earth. The remedy to this is your little knife. You kill him, he’ll butcher no more workers. Second reason why,” Uthste said, “is why the first emperor of Bellona sacked the patchwork city-states
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August Clarke (Metal from Heaven)
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I never saw Khia until she was in my face, but by then it was too late; she had already plunged the butcher knife deep into my stomach.
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Mz. Lady P. (Thug Passion)
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Hell, we’re already more compatible than Cory and I ever were.” “You mean she hasn’t tried to stave in your head with an ashtray or cut off your balls with a butcher knife?
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Chet Williamson (A Haunting of Horrors: A Twenty-Novel eBook Bundle of Horror and the Occult)