spine-chilling
Americanadjective
adjective
Etymology
Origin of spine-chilling
First recorded in 1945–50; spine ( def. ) + chilling ( def. )
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
The best film goes first: It’s about a father-daughter camping trip that goes horribly wrong at the hands of a creepy-looking park ranger and, in a spine-chilling scene, living sand.
From New York Times • Dec. 8, 2023
Narrator Kirby Heyborne fully commits to the breathless lyricism of Bradbury’s prose poetry, casting a delightfully spine-chilling spell, alive with drama, agape with wonder and bristling with delicious shivers.
From Seattle Times • Oct. 7, 2022
The unlikely meshing of gospel and rap, spine-chilling lyrics and clever sampling of Stevie Wonder’s “Pastime Paradise” would eventually turn the single into a chart-topping hit and catapult the rapper’s decades-long musical career.
From Washington Post • Sep. 29, 2022
It is the most hauntingly and psychologically complex ghost story I’ve ever seen, presented with an ambiguous gentility that is literally spine-chilling.
From Los Angeles Times • Oct. 29, 2021
And I began to hear his hoarse roaring, that aaonh cry as rich as gold or honey and as spine-chilling as the depths of an unsafe mine or a thousand angry bees.
From "Life of Pi" by Yann Martel
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
