Stephen Embleton

Mirari did it again! Cover Illustration and Design Stephen Embleton (2026) Mirari asked me to illustrate firstly the reissue of their first published author and title "The Tilted Pentagram" to coincide with the release of Book 2, "Archive of the Sixth" in what will be "The Last Reformation Series". It was a privilege to be asked to represent these in an way I could, and as usual, Mirari had an excellent, if challenging brief: STAINED GLASS! BOOK 1 Stephen Embleton (2026) The Tilted Pentagram Detail The Tilted Pentagram Detail The Tilted Pentagram Detail BOOK 2 Stephen Embleton (2026) Archive of the Sixth Detail Archive of the Sixth Detail Archive of the Sixth Detail Archive of the Sixth Detail The process: The variations Then, part of the brief was to design a labyrinth! I set myself the challenge of creating a unique labyrinth with two entrances and two paths to the centre – representing the two wands (bone and wood).

I was asked to design and illustrate the cover an amazing anthology of short stories and poetry by young African emigrants who have found themselves journeying – for whatever reason – to Australia. Something I personally understand, finding yourself in a strange land with strange people, trying to figure out where you fit into the world. THE BRIEF AND THE SYMBOLS: The team of Dr Doris Asante, from the James Cook University, Australia along with editors Eugen Bacon and Dominique Hecq, asked me to create a symbolically infused cover that brought in two key Ghanaian symbols – and wow, SYMBOLS ARE MY THING! The first is the "fern", from the Adinkra symbol "Aya" embodying endurance, defiance against adversity, resourcefulness, and independence. I wanted to have it redrawn as a painted, brush symbol to give it some life and texture. The base shapes, I used a fluid infinity shape. The second is the Sankofa bird, symbolising the need to reflect on the past, to build a succe...

For a while, I have been developing a typeface, a headline font, which I took inspiration from many of the forms in the Vai syllabary (the Vai people from Liberia) and the Beria script (Chad/Sudan). I recently had the perfect opportunity to use this bold and unique lettering, and fine tune the typeface for a book cover illustration and design ! Below are the Latin-based characters I created and their variants. I also wanted to play with the joining ability of many of the letters, their serifs doing interesting things with one another. In an ideal world, a Borderless world, for and from my Continent and its free-roaming peoples. Find out more about the book cover here. Illustration, Typography and Design – Stephen Embleton (2026)

On Saturday 18 April 2026 I had the pleasure of being included in this excellent discussion, hosted by The British Fantasy Society : Language in SFFH – Origins & Culture. Thanks to our host Marve Michael Anson for the brilliant questions and gathering these perspectives and influences from Trinidad and Tobago, Hawai'i, Armenia, southern Africa and more. And for me it's always great to be able to speak about The Sauúti Collective's worldbuilding, especially in with language. Along with R.S.A Garcia, Shay Kauwe and Arkady Martine, we covered a range of areas including our various approaches to the creation or use of language when building a fictional culture or world. It was so good to get a variety of perspectives. Thanks again to Marve for including me   Our language is a reflection of who we are – the history, beliefs and values we hold – and the culture we live in. The same is true for the worlds we write. But where do you draw inspiration? How do you construct a lan...

  As always, I got an excellent brief from both the publisher, Mirari Press , and author, Lebogang Matseke. Lebo's notes on characters and clothing were essential – even down to Kgosi's sneakers! Love those sneakers. What set the tone for me was the description of the "storm goddess" Oya's dress – "ox-blood red blouse and a skirt composed of nine distinct coloured cloths, each panel carrying the memory of her lost children." This gave me the inspiration to use fabric textures throughout (including the frayed fabric for the "ground"), as well as challenging me to use SO MANY colours. This also meant the dress was going to add a visually dynamic, flowing aspect to the illustration – and using a right to left flow for Kgosi stepping from the real world into the Afterlife. Get your copy (not yet!) and find out more at Mirari Press. Death Rattle – 2026 Stephen Embleton As always, it begins with the roughest of rough design and layout sketch. You can...