Johnny Mains - 10.50am - On a panel with Charlie Higson hosted by Robin Ince

Johnny Mains is a British Fantasy Award-winning editor and genre researcher. He was Project Editor on the 2010 re-issue of The Pan Book of Horror Stories, created the critically acclaimed series Dead Funny: Horror Stories by Comedians (co-edited with Robin Ince) and has spent the last five years deep in the archives, uncovering 'lost' stories by notable authors such as Edith Nesbit, Algernon Blackwood, Oscar Cook and Daphne Du Maurier, among others.

As Johnny says most of my life has been consumed by short stories. My first book, as editor, was a tribute to my love of the Pan Horror books. From there I started experimenting with the short form as a writer of three collections of Pan Horror tributes, homages, knock-offs; call them what you will. However, it’s through editing Best British Horror, first for Salt Publishing, then Newcon Press, that I’ve found my true calling as an editor, a compiler, a navigator to the myriad of nightmares that can be yours with a simple turn of the page. I suppose that every book I edit is my own personal anthology – however, to be given carte blanche like this has sent me into a mild panic. I can pick any short story I want? Where to begin, where to be…