Editing Four Past Midnight (section)

==Reception==
Upon its release, Michael A. Morrison in ''[[The Washington Post|Washington Post]]'' called the collection "exceptionally well crafted" with the exception of ''Sun Dog'', praising King's "unexpected similes" and his use of "dreams to reveal character".<ref>{{cite book |last1=Rolls |first1=Albert |title=Stephen King: A Biography: A Biography |date=2008 |publisher=ABC-CLIO |isbn=978-0-313-34573-9 |page=96 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=IeA7ghrMfw4C |access-date=5 April 2020 |language=en}}</ref> Robert Chatain called it possibly King's best book and "a serious, heavyweight effort", characterising the tales as "rich" as well as "fast, tricky, even perverse, like carnival rides that look easy from the ground but turn unexpectedly nasty and vertiginous when we're up in the air".<ref>{{cite book |last1=Rolls |first1=Albert |title=Stephen King: A Biography: A Biography |date=2008 |publisher=ABC-CLIO |isbn=978-0-313-34573-9 |page=97 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=IeA7ghrMfw4C |language=en}}</ref>

However, Josh Rubins in ''[[Entertainment Weekly]]'' graded the anthology a "C+" and considered it formulaic with "enthusiasm" and contemporary setting. Rubins compared a novella "The Langoliers" to—quoting characters of the novella—a "stupid disaster [movie]" and a "bad [television] movie." He found "Secret Window, Secret Garden" bearably suspenseful with a "gimmicky, least convincing [finale]." He called "The Sun Dog" the "simplest, most distinctive story" and praised it as mostly "a delicious black comedy."<ref>{{cite magazine |first=Josh |last=Rubins |date=September 21, 1990 |url=http://www.ew.com/article/1990/09/21/four-past-midnight |title=Four Past Midnight |magazine=[[Entertainment Weekly]] |access-date=November 2, 2015 }}</ref> Andy Solomon in ''[[The New York Times]]'' commented that King's mass appeal comes "ironically from his cliched diction," referring to the anthology's reliance on popular culture for descriptions.<ref>{{cite news |first=Andy |last=Solomon |date=September 2, 1990 |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1990/09/02/books/scared-but-safe.html |title=Scared but Safe |work=[[The New York Times]] |access-date=November 3, 2015 }}</ref>