Genres
Cosmic horror
Horror of the unknowable and incomprehensible, where humanity is cosmically insignificant; also called Lovecraftian horror.
Cosmic horror, also called Lovecraftian or eldritch horror, is a subgenre of horror, fantasy and weird fiction that emphasizes the horror of the unknowable and incomprehensible more than gore or shock. Its pillars: fear of the unknown; human interests, desires and morality carrying no cosmic significance, the entities being beyond human morality rather than evil; helpless protagonists reduced to insignificance; and psychological deterioration or loss of sanity on contact with the truth. H. P. Lovecraft's "The Call of Cthulhu" is the origin point.
The genre is a discipline of withholding: what the reader never fully sees is the engine. A long serial needs to track precisely what has been revealed, and how much, at every chapter, which is story bible work.