儒琴英语文学词汇咀嚼《死亡约定》(The Pact )一书的用词。《死亡约定》 是美国当代畅销书作家朱迪·皮考特（Jodi Picoult）在1998年出版的小说。朱迪·皮考特已经出版了26部小说和短篇小说。她的书在全世界大约印刷了4000万册，被翻译成34种语言。
英语文学词汇 Literature Terms
选词 1：hypotenuse [haɪˈpɑːtənuːs] (直角三角形的)斜边，弦 (n)
Their land, together, formed a square; two triangles meeting along a common hypotenuse. The Hartes’ land was narrow at the driveway and then opened up; the Golds’ land did the reverse, so that the houses were only about an acre apart. But they were separated by a small thicket of woods that did not completely block out the view of the other home.
选词 2： swerve /swɝːv/ 急转弯 （v）
Michael and Melanie, in their separate cars, followed the gray Volvo that belonged to James as it turned onto Wood Hollow Road. A half mile up the hill, at the granite post that announced number thirty-four, James went left. Michael swerved into the next driveway. He turned off the ignition in the truck and stepped out into the small square of light liberated from the passenger compartment, letting Grady and Beau leap up against his hips and chest. The Irish setters danced circles around him as he waited for Melanie to get out of her own car.
选词 3: travesty /ˈtræv.ə.sti/ 嘲弄, 歪曲 (n)
“That’s a travesty,” Melanie said. “A vet who can’t control his own dogs.”
Michael stepped aside as Melanie came to the door and whistled. The dogs barreled by him, bringing inside the brisk scent of night. “They’re Emily’s dogs,” he said. “It makes a difference.”
选词 4：work up 激发， 激起
James felt his throat working up sentences that tangled around each other. “Is he . . . was there a car accident?”
选词 5：speed 飞速， 加速，快速前行 (v)
James’s heart twisted. “Thank you,” he said, hanging up, although he did not know why he was thanking someone who had brought him such horrible news. The moment the receiver was back in place, he had a thousand questions to ask. Where was Christopher hurt? Critically or superficially? Was Emily still with him? What had happened? James dressed in the clothes he’d already thrown into the hamper and made his way downstairs in a matter of minutes. The hospital, he knew, would take him seventeen minutes to reach. He was already speeding down Wood Hollow
选词 6：stuff (常指匆忙或胡乱地）塞，填（V）
Michael buttoned the fly of his jeans and stuffed his feet into tennis shoes. He remembered, too late, that he didn’t have on socks. Fuck the socks.
选词 7： basket case 束手无策 ; 绝望 （俚语）
He had hypothetically wondered, what would happen if a phone call came in the middle of the night, a phone call that had the power to render one speechless and disbelieving. He had expected deep down that he’d be a basket case. And yet here he was, backing carefully out of his driveway, holding up well, the only sign betraying panic a tiny tic in his cheek.
选词 8： litany /ˈlɪt.ən.i/ (对一系列事件、原因等)枯燥冗长的陈述（n）
“James operates there,” Melanie was saying, a soft, slurred litany. “He’ll know who we should contact; what we should do.”
选词 9： a stab of 突发的一阵感觉
“Sweetheart,” Michael said, groping for her hand in the dark, “we don’t know anything yet.” But as he drove past the Hartes’ house he took in the absolute quiet of the scene, the peaceable lack of light in the windows, and he could not help feeling a stab of jealousy at the normality of it all. Why us? he thought, and did not notice the brake lights of a car at the end of Wood Hollow Road, already turning toward town.
选词 10： root for sb 给（某人）以支持
GUS LAY ON THE SIDEWALK between a trio of teenagers with spiked green hair and a couple that was coming as close to sex as possible in a public venue. If Chris ever does that to his hair, she thought, we would . . . Would what? It had never been an issue because, for as long as Gus could remember, Chris had had the same slightly-longer-than-crew-cut hairstyle. And as for Romeo and Juliet here, on her right—well, that was a no-brainer also. As soon as it had begun to matter, Emily and Chris had started dating, which is what everyone had been rooting for in the first place.