What do you think of when you hear the word horror?
Maybe it’s ghosts and haunted houses or fiendish monsters like vampires and zombies. Maybe it’s creepy liminal spaces with an uncanny vibe. You might think about jump scares, dark and mysterious villains, and sights and sounds that make your skin crawl.
Those are all elements or tropes that are often present in horror media, but the genre is so much more.
At its heart, horror is storytelling that explores fear, uncertainty, and the things that make us feel vulnerable or uneasy. A horror story might frighten us with a monster, but it might also frighten us by making us question what’s real, revealing a disturbing secret, or placing an ordinary person in a situation they can’t control.
Horror can make us feel different things:
| Fear | Something dangerous is coming. | ||
| Dread | You know something bad is going to happen, but you don’t know when. | ||
| Suspense | You need to find out what happens next. | ||
| Unease | Something feels wrong, even if you can’t explain why. | ||
| Wonder | Something impossible or supernatural has entered the world. | ||
| Disgust | Something is disturbing or unsettling to look at or imagine. | ||
| Curiosity | You have to know what is hiding behind the door. |
That’s one reason horror can overlap with so many other kinds of stories. A mystery can be horrifying. A science-fiction story can be horrifying. A fantasy story can be horrifying. A folktale can be horrifying. Even a funny story can be horrifying if it makes you laugh while also making you wonder whether you should be worried.
Horror also gives writers a way to explore real fears and difficult questions.
Questions like these can make a story frightening even when there isn’t a single monster in sight.
And horror doesn’t always have to end in way that’s grim or bleak or with a crazy twist. In fact, lots of horror stories are about people finding the courage, intelligence, or determination to face something frightening. The danger is an important part of the story, but so is what the characters do when they encounter it.
For this showcase, we’re taking a broad view of horror. Your story can be frightening, creepy, eerie, mysterious, strange, unsettling, supernatural, or just plain weird. It can make your reader’s heart race and their blood run cold—or simply make them look over their shoulder after they finish reading. So don't worry too much about whether your idea is “scary enough.”
Instead, ask yourself: What do I want my reader to feel?
Once you know the feeling you want to create, you can start figuring out how to get your reader there.
So what will you make scary?
Send your submissions to giftedyouth@americanmensa.org.