SOURCE: "Stephen's Quartet," in Book World—The Washington Post, August 22, 1982, pp. 1-2.

Gifford is an American novelist and critic. In the following review, he lauds King's conversational writing style in Different Seasons.

It's not often that a single individual puts you in mind of both J. B. Priestley and Yogi Berra, but when someone does you might as well pay attention. An extraordinary occurrence. But then Stephen King, who managed this paradoxical feat, is not an ordinary writer. Though, to further confuse the issue, it is precisely King's remarkable ordinariness that makes him what he is, one of the world's best-selling authors—and one who pretty well dwarfs the meager talents with whom he customarily shares the tops of the lists. Before I further complicate my observations on King and his new collection of novellas, Different Seasons, let me get back to Priestley for a moment.

Priestley, in...