This story from Stephen King builds on a common legend in folklore in which an unsuspecting protagonist is tempted by the devil. King made two changes to the standard plot that result in a truly frightening the tale. First, the devil’s target is an innocent nine-year-old boy. Second, instead of the devil’s usual objective of offering an earthly reward in exchange for the boy’s soul, this devil is hungry and plans to give the poor lad a heavenly reward by eating him. Themes: isolation, innocence, the supernatural, deception, fear, religious belief, life-long trauma, aging and death.

Combine a boy with his throat cut who runs out onto a country road, a seemingly deserted town where the only community building still in use is a desecrated church, a hoard of murderous children, and a mysterious presence living in the surrounding cornfields, and you have a typical Stephen King horror/thriller. You get the feeling that King deliberately set out to make sure that readers wouldn’t be too upset when the main characters (a bickering couple driving through the American Midwest) meet their inevitable gruesome end. Themes: cultism, exploited religion, human sacrifice, the supernatural.

In this story from Stephen King, the last swim of the season by four college students also proves to be the last swim of their lives. On an alcohol-fuelled whim, the foursome drive to a deserted lake to swim out to a raft moored fifty yards off shore, say good-bye to summer, and then swim back. As they reach the raft, they learn to their horror that a mysterious black mass floating on the surface is stalking them for its next meal(s). Themes include teenage exuberance, machismo, chauvinism, sexuality, fear, the unknown/supernatural.