Citing many examples, he defines "terror" as the suspenseful moment in horror before the actual monster is revealed. "Horror," King writes, is that moment at which one sees the creature/aberration that causes the terror or suspense, a "shock value".

The difference between Terror and Horror is the difference between awful apprehension and sickening realisation: between the smell of death and stumbling against a corpse. Horror [as] a genre of film and fiction & relies on horrifying

and situations to tell stories and prompt reactions in [its] audiences.