The thing that surprised him most about dying was how very much it hurt.

(Diane Duane, The Door into Sunset, 1991)
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If Ronnie Wilson had known, as he woke up, that in just a couple of hours he would be dead, he would have planned his day somewhat differently.

(aus: Peter James, Dead Man's Footsteps, 2008)

The wall whispers to him with splintered wooden lips. 'They'll worship you. They'll worship you. They'll worship you...'

(Aus: A Dark so Deadly, Stuart MacBride, 2017)
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My calendar is full of dead people.

(Jodi Picoult, The Book of Two Ways, 2020)
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Es war einer dieser Morgen, an denen er die Krawatte dreimal binden musste, bis die Längen stimmten.

(Martin Suter, Allmen und die Dahlien, 2013

I forget everything between footsteps.

(Stuart Turton, The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle, 2018)

Against the stars a turtle passes, carrying four elephants on its shell.
Both turtle and elephants are bigger than people might expect, but out between the stars the difference between huge and tiny is, comparatively speaking, very small.

(Terry Pratchett, The Last Continent, 1998)