This document provides 8 tips for improving scary stories. It recommends tailoring the story to the audience by considering factors like age, location, and fears. The second tip suggests basing the setting in real life locations close to the audience to add credibility. The third tip advises using suspense over surprise to cultivate fear. Subsequent tips include tapping into common human fears, keeping some details mysterious, drawing inspiration from horror masters like Ridley Scott and Stephen King, and including relatable themes of fear. The document concludes by suggesting making protagonists suffer through absurd situations.

1. 8 Tips
to Improve Your
Scary Story

3. You are trying to tell your friends
a scary story but then, you
find out that they are
not scared

4. You don’t want to be a lame person
with a bunch of bedtime stories
so what do you do now???

5. Check this out now!!!
and you will master the techniques
of creating really scary stories

6. Tailor your story for
your audience. Find the
best formula for each.
1
Age?
Region?
Education?
Income?
Culture?
Ethnicity?
Gender?

7. Age?
Region?
Education?
Income?
Culture?
Ethnicity?
Gender?
Evil Creature?
Psychopath?
Alien?
Religion or Mythology?
Supernatural Power?
Inescapable?
Loss of Identity?

8. Age?
Region?
Education?
Average
Culture?
Asian
Women
Evil Creature?
Psychopath?
Alien?
Religion or Mythology?
Supernatural Power?
Inescapable?
Loss of Identity?

9. The best reaction happens with
the fittest formula

10. Make the story setting
based on real life
Bring the time & location
close to the audience
2 Rural?
Public?
Rainy?
Alone?
Night?
Private?
Urban?
Morning?
Windy?
Group?

11. Rural?
Public?
Rainy?
Alone?
Night?
Private?
Urban?
Morning?
Windy?
Group?
In a rainy night,
Sam is walking alone
on the street of Detroit,
seeking a cheap
apartment to stay.

12. Background based on real life can
add extra Credibility
Settings close to the audience’s
experience can increase
sense of substitution

13. 3
Use suspense to cultivate fear,
Not surprise

14. Suspense is related to Conflict
Audience enjoy uncertainty

15. Tap into
common human fears
4

16. Think about what people
commonly fear
and use them to launch
your imagination
Hospital? Knife?
Elevator?
Blood?
Death?
Deep Ocean?
Height? Insect?

17. 5
Shroud your Antagonist in Mystery.
The unknown is the mother of all fears.
Source: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0887618516300469

18. Leave some mysteries
unanswered
It’s spookier that way

19. Learn from the masters
Draw inspiration from authors/filmmakers/poets
6

20. Ridley Scott

21. Ridley Scott
Most famous for the creation of the Alien monster movie franchise

22. He is most famous for the
creation of the
Alien monster movie franchise

23. Ridley Scott
His stories always incorporate themes of meaning,
what is our purpose in life? Concepts that
people struggle with and fear on a regular basis.

24. He utilizes core human fears such
as darkness to increase suspense

25. Make sure your story has some
element of instinctual human fear
(darkness, heights, animals) to
which most people can relate.

26. Stephen King

27. He has written dozens of horror and
thriller novels that have been adapted
into famous films and tv series

28. Stephen King always incorporates
relatable themes
and human fears
that keeps the reader/viewer
engaged

29. R. L. Stein

30. He has written many
children's novels and stories
designed to expose kids to
elements of horror and
thrillers without scaring
them for life

31. R.L. Stine understands that every good horror story
needs some type of twist or surprise
to release the reader/viewers tension

32. Story to consider
7

33. Stephen King: Gerald’s Game

34. A woman is trapped handcuffed to a bed after her
lover suffers a heart attack

35. Fear and threat doesn’t have to come from a
personified entity

36. Jed Kurzel: The babadook

37. A widowed mother deals with the chaos that comes
with raising a hyperactive and aggressive child

38. Something as innocent as motherhood can come with
its own elements of horror

39. Peter Benchley: Jaws

40. A great white shark terrorizes a string of beaches of
the coast of a small town in Maine
a

41. Not directly seeing the threat itself makes it all the
more terrifying. The fear of the unknown is greater
than that of a shark.

42. Things

43. Be Mean!
Especially Towards the protagonists!

44. Make the
Protagonists go
through absurd &
crazy situations

45. Sara rushes into a hotel to find help because
she was being chased by a maniac with a knife.
Sara: “Hey! There is A MAN CHASING
ME with a knife and I need some help!”
Receptionist: “Sure, I will help you DIE!”

46. Make Them Feel
The Pain!!!

47. Sara runs for her life after her experience
with the receptionist.
The receptionist jumps out from behind the
desk and slices Her throat.
The desk receptionist turns around and says:
Receptionist: “Nobody told the silly ol’ girl to
run into my house! Muahahahahaha!”
Sara sees a chance to escape this horrific
madness and runs away with her neck
pouring blood all over her clothes
and hands.

48. Credits:
Kilgarron - Flickr
H.R. Geiger
Jennifer Kent
Ralph Mcquarie
Rob Reiner