How to Use tortuous in a Sentence

tortuous

adjective
Definition of tortuousnext
Synonyms for tortuousnext
  • And even when the rules do apply, the process is tortuous.
    — Michael Holtz, The Christian Science Monitor, 12 Apr. 2018
  • If [the dosage] is less, [the person] will go through very tortuous scenes.
    — Sebastian Shukla, CNN, 13 Mar. 2018
  • Just to, just to bring it to the fore and remind people, uh, how, how tortuous this has been.
    — Leila Atassi, cleveland, 25 Feb. 2022
  • The typing wasn’t the only tortuous part of the writing process for her.
    — oregonlive, 3 Oct. 2022
  • The roads are all tortuous and the houses are high up from the street, each with a garden of some sort in its small front yard.
    — Phoebe Wall Howard, Detroit Free Press, 28 May 2018
  • Time and again, the movie strains for effect, favoring the tortuous over the plain.
    — Anthony Lane, The New Yorker, 31 Mar. 2017
  • And like some kind of tortuous finger trap, the more London has fought against it, the tighter and more painful the bind has become.
    — Tom McTague, The Atlantic, 15 Sep. 2020
  • Building a mosque in France is a tortuous endeavor at the best of times.
    — New York Times, 31 Mar. 2021
  • The path to full-on enlightenment is, of course, a bit more tortuous.
    — Robert Wright, WIRED, 9 Apr. 2018
  • For the first time in Britain's tortuous Brexit saga, the true believers are running the show.
    — Alexander Smith, NBC News, 27 July 2019
  • Among the many milestones that marked the tortuous path of Vietnam War, the Tet Offensive stands out.
    — Time, 30 Jan. 2018
  • What many loyal readers of Mr. King see as the magnum opus of his career has had a tortuous road to the big screen.
    — Gilbert Cruz, New York Times, 3 May 2017
  • The tortuous games –the type that combine a lot of nail-biting and lead to higher blood pressure– are the ones the Giants have been winning.
    — Kerry Crowley, The Mercury News, 20 Sep. 2019
  • That’s just a sample during a tortuous one-week stretch.
    — Chris Fedor, cleveland, 19 Feb. 2021
  • At the end of this long, tortuous road stand the smoldering remains of the tower in North Kensington.
    — Ian Volner, The Atlantic, 19 June 2017
  • His long, tortuous recovery won him the Comeback Player of the Year award.
    — Scott D. Pierce, The Salt Lake Tribune, 16 Aug. 2021
  • The case took a tortuous route before landing in Ms. Dunikowski’s lap.
    — New York Times, 25 Nov. 2021
  • A month later, Lynn filmed Nick’s tortuous, nearly two-minute process of figuring out how to put on a T-shirt and ball cap.
    — S.l. Price, SI.com, 9 May 2017
  • The reunion capped a tortuous day for Sanchez, who was accompanied at times by her son.
    — Deon J. Hampton, NBC News, 7 July 2023
  • Even in the recent era of plodding and tortuous pace of play, there was zero chance of getting all that research into a game.
    — Bryce Miller, San Diego Union-Tribune, 14 Apr. 2023
  • The new design marks the latest chapter in the project’s tortuous history.
    — BostonGlobe.com, 29 Sep. 2021
  • The bottom line is that the tortuous student debt complex punishes too many of the people that it is supposed to help.
    — Caitlin Zaloom, Time, 29 Oct. 2019
  • This all seems inhumane and tortuous after knowing that there’s a better way to work and lead your life.
    — Jack Kelly, Forbes, 2 Sep. 2021
  • An 80-year-old grandmother jets halfway around the world in her tortuous quest to exhume her father's bones from a mass grave.
    — Stephen Dalton, The Hollywood Reporter, 21 Feb. 2018
  • The collapse of the tortuous year-and-a-half partnership, Bratcher notes, came as Sound of Freedom was taking off in theaters.
    — Miles Klee, Rolling Stone, 14 Dec. 2023
  • This chart shows the tortuous paths that evolution has taken in these beetles.
    — Carl Zimmer, Discover Magazine, 14 July 2010
  • But having a more functional Muni system is just one step in the long, tortuous process to get people out of their cars.
    — Rachel Swan, San Francisco Chronicle, 21 Apr. 2018
  • For one year and three days, marchers followed a tortuous route that wound west before looping north to Yan'an in central Shaanxi province.
    — Jennifer Lin, Philly.com, 22 May 2017
  • This decision marks the culmination of a tortuous debate among Arab governments about how to handle the Syrian tragedy.
    — Emile Hokayem, Foreign Affairs, 23 May 2023
  • The themes of this embarrassing episode were recapitulated throughout two more tortuous years of talks.
    — Mike Gallagher, Foreign Affairs, 26 July 2023

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'tortuous.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Last Updated: