Frank Byrns bought my stories The Scent of Rose Petals (Nov. '09) and Graceful Blur (coming Mar. '10).  I asked him to talk about what he looks for as an Editor/Publisher.

"What exactly are you looking for?"

If I had a penny for every time I’ve heard that in my role as Editor / Publisher of A Thousand Faces, the Quarterly Journal of Superhuman Fiction (PLUG!). . . .

Well, I’d have a penny. But if I had a penny for EACH time that I’ve heard that question, well, then, I’d have a LOT of pennies. (A little grammar humor for you there. If you don’t get it, please don’t send anything to A Thousand Faces, the Quarterly Journal of Superhuman Fiction (PLUG! x 2).

So, anyway. Back to the oft-asked question: “What exactly are you looking for?”

And the honest answer?

“I don’t know.”

And that’s the God’s-honest truth. I want to read a story that’s well-written, obviously. Spelling, proper grammar, mechanically sound. I want strong, interesting characters. I don’t have to like them, necessarily, but they better be interesting, or else I have no . . . er, interest in them. And, given the scope and focus of A Thousand Faces, the Quarterly Journal of Superhuman Fiction (PLUG! x 3), there should be some element of superhuman-ness to the story.

But that’s pretty much it. Other than that?

I don’t know.

Just write a good story. Write something that makes me say, “Damn, I wish I had written that.”

Romance. Horror. Comedy.

A farmboy who can talk to pigs. A turn-of-the-century cyborg. A vampire and his adopted son. A guy in love with a hero in post-WWII New York (Ian Thomas Healy PLUG!). Before I read these stories, I didn’t know I was looking for them. But once I read them, I knew they were exactly what I was looking for.

I guess it’s like that old definition of art. Or porn. “I can’t tell you what it is, but I know it when I see it.”

Frank Byrns is the editor and publisher of A Thousand Faces, the Quarterly Journal of Superhuman Fiction (www.thousand-faces.com). His third collection of short superhero fiction, Things to Come, is now available wherever fine books are sold. Visit him online at www.frankbyrns.com.