Lamb To the Slaughter

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Mary Maloney's husband Patrick tells his wife that that he is leaving her, and shocked beyond reply, she grabs a large leg of lamb from the freezer, and hits him on the head with the frozen meat, killing him. Hours later, as the police search for the murder weapon, Mary begs them all to eat the leg of lamb she has cooked so that it won’t go to waste, and the story ends with a final ironic twist as the police officers consume the leg of lamb, all while discussing the mysterious disappearance of the murder weapon. (Holt Literature & Language Arts, 2003)

This lesson was created as part of the Anthology Alignment Project, during which teachers created CCSS-aligned lessons for existing literary and information texts in anthologies. All page numbers and unit/week designations found in this lesson relate to the edition of the anthology named above. If you are using a trade book or different edition of this title, the page/unit/week references in this lesson will not match. Consult the content referenced in the body of the lesson to determine appropriate page numbers for your text.

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