Growing up, I was primarily a novel reader, but once I got into writing, I discovered short stories and eventually grew into an aficionado. Then, once I graduated college and went about looking to get a job in publishing, short fiction seemed like it was a good place to start. I figured that I would start there and eventually transition to book publishing, but it just didn’t work out that way (for a variety of reasons). It would have been easier to make a full-time career out of book publishing, to be sure, but that was the only real reason I was interested in transitioning away from short fiction. But anyway, I guess the real reason I gravitated toward anthologies was that at the time there didn’t really seem like there would ever be an opportunity for me to edit a magazine myself, as opposed to being an assistant editor at one (my first job in publishing was at The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction.) But after several years of being an assistant editor, I yearned to remove the adjective from my job title, and anthologies seemed like my only viable option. And of course I love anthologies, so that was a factor too!

Here’s a question not addressed directly:

WHY the fascination with anthologies, John? You clearly have a talent and proclivity for editing them, but where did THAT come from? (as opposed to, say, editing novels)