The Folk Horror sub-genre originated in Western and Central Europe with isolated communities who continue to practice ancient rituals. Many of these rituals go back to pre-Christian times.
Cosmic Horror is a sub-genre critics and writers attribute to H. P. Lovecraft. The sub-genre "stresses the insignificance of humanity" (Jones, p.16).
There was Suburban Horror before Stephen King. But he mastered the genre with gems like Carrie. The stories that King has written since seem to be saying, "Sure. Castles may be haunted. Werewolves may reside in the moors. Vampires may be found in Transylvania. But the suburbs have their horrors too. And I am going to tell you about them."
Representation of a wicker man, from Aylett Sammes, Britannia antiqua illustrata (1676).
Public Domain. Used under Creative Commons public domain CC0 image.
Shirley Jackson's the Lottery: a Graphic Adaptation by 
The New Annotated H. P. Lovecraft by H.P. Lovecraft defined cosmic and weird tales as "the creation of a 'certain atmosphere of breathless and unexplainable dread' and the suspension, if not violation, of 'fixed laws of nature'." (Cardin, p.282)
Carrie by 
The Vanishing Hitchhiker: American urban legends and their meanings by Suburban gothic is a mid and late twentieth-century "subgenre of the wider American Gothic tradition which dramatises anxieties arising from the mass urbanisation of the United States and usually features suburban settings, preoccupations and protagonists." (Murphy, p.20)
Cardin, M. (2017). Horror literature through history an encyclopedia of the stories that speak to our deepest fears (Kindle) Greenwood.
Jones, D. (2021). Horror a very short introduction. Oxford University Press.
King, S. (2010). Danse macabre. Gallery.
Landis, J. (2016). Monsters in the movies: 100 Years of Cinematic nightmares. DK.
Luckhurst, R. (2018). The Astounding Illustrated History of Fantasy & Horror. Flame Tree Publishing.
Murphy, B.. M. (2009), The Suburban Gothic in American Popular Culture. Palgrave Macmillan.
Skal, D. J. (2020). Fright favourites: 31 movies to haunt your Halloween and beyond. Running Press.
Turitz, N. and Zimmerman, B. (2020). Horror: An illustrated history of vampires, zombies, monsters & more. Centennial Books, an imprint of Centennial Media, LLC.
