And since we’ve mentioned Stephen King, the master of creepy stories believes there are three types of terror:

• The Gross-out: the sight of a severed head tumbling down a flight of stairs, it’s when the lights go out or something green and slimy splatters against your arm.
• The Horror: the unnatural, spiders the size of bears, the dead waking up and walking around, it’s when the lights go out, and something with claws grabs you by the arm. 
• The Terror: the worst one, when you come home and notice everything you own has been taken away and replaced by an exact substitute. It’s when the lights go out and you feel something behind you, you hear it, you feel its breath against your ear, but when you turn around, there’s nothing there.

RELATED: 112 Stephen King Quotes On Everything That’s Life

According to novelist R.L. Stine, an author has to get inside their narrator’s head to be effective in all of these real horror fields. If we’re seeing through the eyes of a character in a scary situation, we start to feel like we are in a scary situation. 

“There’s no formula, I think you have to create a very close point of view. You have to be in the eyes of the narrator. Everything that happens, all the smells, all the sounds; then your reader starts to identify with that character and that’s what makes something really scary.” (via AdWeek)

RELATED: These 2-Sentence Horror Stories Will Send Shivers Down Your Spine

RELATED: Short Horror Stories You Can Read In 1 Minute For Bite-Sized Chills

RELATED: 110 One Line Horror Stories To Give You Goosebumps

RELATED: 40 Short Spine-Chilling Stories For Those Who Like To Be Spooked, As Shared Online