Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Easily falling into shivers or small fragments; not firmly cohering; brittle.
  • Pertaining to or resembling a shiver or shivering; characterized by a shivering motion: as, a shivery undulation.
  • Inclined or disposed to shiver.
  • Causing shivering; chill.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adjective Tremulous; shivering.
  • adjective Easily broken; brittle; shattery.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective Given to shivering; tending to shiver.
  • adjective Easily broken; brittle.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adjective provoking fear terror
  • adjective cold enough to cause shivers

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

shiver +‎ -y

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Examples

  • The musicians had been softly playing some "shivery" music.

    Joe Strong on the Trapeze or The Daring Feats of a Young Circus Performer Vance Barnum

  • It gave them a "shivery" sort of feeling, and they were glad to cuddle down in their warm beds.

    The Bobbsey Twins at Home Laura Lee Hope

  • Max was not up in matters pertaining to ghosts in general, and could only make a guess at emitting the proper kind of sound; but really it did seem quite "shivery," even to the boy responsible for making it.

    The Strange Cabin on Catamount Island Lawrence J. Leslie

  • He sure did like music, especially them Spanish songs what made a fella kind of shivery and sad-like from his boots up.

    Sundown Slim Henry Herbert Knibbs 1909

  • Here is a new series of mystery stories for girls by an author who knows the kind of stories every girl wants to read -- mystery of the "shivery" sort, adventure that makes the nerves tingle, clever "detecting" and a new lovable heroine, Judy Bolton, whom all girls will take to their hearts at once.

    Marjorie's Busy Days Carolyn Wells 1902

  • You know, it makes me feel kind of shivery, even though I know that they won't do anything to us when they do catch us, Jack. "

    The Boy Scout Automobilists or, Jack Danby in the Woods Robert Maitland

  • I should not like to be a blade of grass on your land, she concluded, with a little shivery shudder.

    BY THE TURTLES OF TASMAN 2010

  • In the shivery gray of mountain dawn, Stubener was routed from his blankets by old Pat.

    Chapter II 2010

  • A shivery gray fellow named Hyppo, the Hypothermic Hippopotamus (see below), who sips whiskey from a flask and angrily fires wool socks into the crowd.

    Little-Known Facts About the Twins Jason Gay 2010

  • Alongside works by Pablo Neruda and Ko Un are poems drawn from Estonian, Hebrew, Catalan, Swedish Eeva-Liisa Manner's shivery "The trees are bare. . ." in which "Autumn / leads its fog-horses to the river", all of them unknown, all demanding further investigation.

    Being Human, edited by Neil Astley – review 2011

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