panic vs spook

panic

verb
  • To cause (someone) to feel panic (“overwhelming fear or fright”); also, to frighten (someone) into acting hastily. 

  • To cause (a computer system) to crash. 

  • To feel panic, or overwhelming fear or fright; to freak out, to lose one's head. 

  • Of a computer system: to crash. 

  • To highly amuse, entertain, or impress (an audience watching a performance or show). 

adj
  • Pertaining to or resulting from overwhelming fear or fright. 

  • Of fear, fright, etc: overwhelming or sudden. 

noun
  • Foxtail millet or Italian millet (Setaria italica), the second-most widely grown species of millet. 

  • Overwhelming fear or fright, often affecting groups of people or animals; (countable) an instance of this; a fright, a scare. 

  • A rapid reduction in asset prices due to broad efforts to raise cash in anticipation of such prices continuing to decline. 

  • A plant of the genus Panicum, or of similar plants of other genera (especially Echinochloa and Setaria) formerly included within Panicum; panicgrass or panic grass. 

  • The edible grain obtained from one of the above plants. 

  • A highly amusing or entertaining performer, performance, or show; a riot, a scream. 

spook

verb
  • To frighten or make nervous (especially by startling). 

  • To become frightened (by something startling). 

  • To haunt. 

noun
  • A ghost or phantom. 

  • An undercover agent or spy. 

  • A hobgoblin. 

  • A scare or fright. 

  • A psychiatrist. 

  • A player who engages in hole carding by attempting to glimpse the dealer's hole card when the dealer checks under an ace or a 10 to see if a blackjack is present. 

  • A metaphysical manifestation; an artificial distinction or construct. 

How often have the words panic and spook occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )