Stephen Embleton

  Thanks to Dr Ainehi Edoro and Brittle Paper for an excellent feature of African Science Fiction and Fantasy short stories, including my Sauúti novella "Undulation" ! 🙏🏼 ❤️ 43 Short Stories to Get You Caught Up on New African Sci-fi/Fantasy. “The list features established voices like Dilman Dila, NK Jemisin, Nnedi Okorafor, Deji Bryce Olukotun, Tade Thompson, Stephen Embleton, and many who are relatively new on the scene like Tobi Ogundiran and Adam Oyebanjo.” Featuring 6 The Sauúti Collective stories, 5 in the Mothersound Anthology .  Adelehin Ijasan – “Xhova” Somto Ihezue and Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki – “A City, A Desert and all their Dirges” Stephen Embleton – ‘Undulation” Tobias S Buckell – “The Groves Lament” J Umeh – “Kalabashing” Eugen Bacon – “Sina, The Child With No Echo” Find out more about the Sauútiverse and the Mothersound Anthology .

2024 Nommo Award winner for Best Novella by an African , presented at Glasgow WorldCon, for his Sauúti novella, “Undualtion” , published by Android Press in “Mothersound: the Sauútiverse Anthology ”  (2023). The Nommo Awards was special! An awesome feeling being nominated but special winning, for Sauúti . Such a great event for us all in person! Meeting friends and colleagues 🙏🏼👏🏼❤️ It was amazing to receive the Nommo Novella Award from Nnedi Okorafor, one of the best novella writers out there, and writing African stories her way. The awesome Nnedi Okorafor Reading from "Undulation" With Wole Talabi and Tendai Huchu Love these guys! More featured on File 770 , Brittle Paper , and at Glasgow 2024 . And Brittle Paper's Glasgow Roundup .

It was a real pleasure to be able to create something unique for a friend and Sauúti Collective colleague – Cheryl Ntumy – for her new novella coming out with Atthis Arts press: a custom display typeface and title design. Design & Typography: Stephen Embleton, Illustration: Akintoba Kalejaye Find Atthis Arts here. A latinised version of the Adinkra alphabet from Ghana (because Cheryl is Ghanaian!), it has some fantastic characteristics and a very modular form which made it a fun, yet simple, design to work on. I first focused on the letters needed for Cheryl's book cover, and then fleshed out the other characters, as well as creating a "light" version. One happy accident for the cover design was incorporating the "working" components of each letter in the design itself. i.e. when I work on fonts, I find the common weights (stroke thicknesses) and common shapes, and move these around to exact positions. And by making them separate bright colours enables m

  I’m grateful to have both “Bones & Runes” (YA urban fantasy novel) and “Undulation” (my Sauúti novella) as finalists in the African Speculative Fiction (ASFS) 2024 Illube Nommo Awards . And to share the list with Sauúti Collective fam, Cheryl Ntumy, Eugen Bacon, Wole Talabi, Ihezue Somto Rodney and Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki “Bones and Runes” was first acknowledged by the James Currey Prize in 2021, and believed in enough by Abibiman Publishing to publish in the UK in 2022. 🙏🏼📖👀💫 #nommoawards Read the full category lists below, and the full Nommo Awards list here . Novel Bones and Runes by Stephen Embleton, (Abibiman Publishing, 2022) Dazzling by Chikodili Emelumadu (Hachette; Wildifre, Headline Publishing Group, 2023) Don’t answer when they call your name by Ukamaka Olisakwe (Masobe Books, 2023) Shigidi and the Brass Head of Olabufon  by Wole Talabi (Gollancz and DAW Books, 2023) Vagabonds! by Eloghosa Osunde, (Harper Collins; 4th Estate and Riverhead Books, 2022) Warrior o

Thanks to Mame Bougouma Diene for moderating an excellent panel at Nice Fictions on “The Building Blocks of Worldbuilding”. Mame invited me to join Michèle Laframboise, Stéphane Arnier and Benjamin Lupu to discuss our experience in creating fictional worlds – in cluding RPG worlds and characters – and  I got to speak about The Sauúti Collective and the world we’ve created. 🪐🚀💫 Gratefully, the panel was in English! Michèle was in Canada, Stéphane Arnier in Finland, Benjamin Lupu in-person at the Nice Fictions event (Nice, France), and Mame in Kinshasa (DRC) and myself in Mézos (France). Watch the panel here.

  In January 2024, the BSFA (British Science Fiction Association), and producer Zoe Mantas, asked if I would record a reading of fellow African SFF writer  Nick Wood's  short story “A Pall of Moondust” – originally published in Fission #1 . Needless to say it was an absolute honour to read our dear departed friend's story! And pleased it was the first episode of the BSFA Pod launching in May 2024. Nick worked tirelessly to bring African SFF voices to the fore and to give us the recognition and access to the world's platforms that we need to be seen outside of the Continent. I hope I did it justice, bru. 🙏🏼 ❤️ Now available to listen.

  Final Cover – Stephen Embleton 2024 It was a pleasure to create the cover for Sauúti colleague Xan van Rooyen's aetherpunk novella "Waypoint Seven" being published by the newly established Mirari Press in South Africa. It gave me the opportunity to explore my digital illustrating to the extreme by incorporating my design and drawing skills – and it would not be the same if I didn't have an understanding of how physical illustrations (brushwork, pencils, paints and textures) really look. It was daunting to start – particularly wanting to deliver Xan something that did their story justice – no pressure. But with Mirari Press' Marius du Plessis having a love and understanding of design, he gave me so much free reign to play. And with each of the phases below, he encouraged and gave feedback (mostly Wow! and keep going). This is very rare with clients. And it was with this collaboration that the illustration and design blossomed over ten days. GET YOUR COPY OF &quo