Sentence-Imitation Exercise: Complex Sentences

A complex sentence is a sentence that contains an independent clause and at least one dependent clause. This sentence-imitation exercise will give you practice in connecting independent clauses with dependent clauses using subordinating conjunctions.

Use each of the ten complex sentences below as the model for a new sentence of your own.

Example:
Original sentence: Whenever I look at a mountain, I expect it to turn into a volcano.

Imitation: Whenever I bite into an apple, I expect a worm to crawl out any minute.

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1. The air whistled around me as I ran down the dark street.
2. The dog hid in the bedroom and whimpered while Chris played his violin.
3. When I was a child, I would place the covers over my head before I went to sleep.
4. One hot summer evening, my sister and I watched in awe as bolts of lightning from a distant storm lit up the sky.
5. "It is difficult, when faced with a situation you cannot control, to admit you can do nothing."
   _{(Lemony Snicket, Horseradish: Bitter Truths You Can't Avoid, 2007)}
6. "When I write, I feel like an armless, legless man with a crayon in his mouth."
   _{(Kurt Vonnegut)}
7. "As she walked down the stairs into the club, she was looking forward to a seething, teeming, wriggling, wiggling throng of dancers."
   _{(Nick Hornby, Juliet, Naked, 2009)}
8. "There is love enough in this world for everybody, if people will just look."
   _{(Kurt Vonnegut, Cat's Cradle, 1963)}
9. "As Pecola put the laundry bag in the wagon, we could hear Mrs. Breedlove hushing and soothing the tears of the little pink-and-yellow girl."
   _{(Toni Morrison, The Bluest Eye, 1970)}
10. "Miracles are like pimples, because once you start looking for them you find more than you ever dreamed you'd see."
    _{(Lemony Snicket, The Lump of Coal, 2008)}