Stephen Embleton

"Riley" I have been wanting to do a large watercolour of my wife, Riley, and finally got around to doing it had having a ton of fun in the process. I'm usually fairly tight when it comes to watercolour so this was a chance to experiment and be as loose as I could. Framed. Check out my other watercolor and ink: various ink and watercolour , and  Inktober 2019 Pencil work Base colours and background Adding more skin tones Keeping the pencil work in Detail Check out my other watercolor and ink:  various ink and watercolour , and  Inktober 2019

Various logo designs and rebranding I have done since 2000.  2019 2019 2020 2004 2004 2002 2000

My latest short story, Journal of a DNA Pirate , was published in the latest anthology AfroSFv3 . Background: In 2010, while writing my speculative fiction novel, Soul Searching, and having sent it to a top SA publisher (waiting and waiting) I decided to carry on writing. But I wanted something simple and not as bogged down in size as a novel. I decided a blog style story would work to be able to write every day (almost every day) and rather than having a preconceived idea of where the story needed to go, I would take each day where I left off. I left it for a while (no ending done) and then revisited it in 2011. And that was it. During this time I had two large publishers in SA take the Soul Searching manuscript for two years each (with revisions done) before they finally rejected (first – 2009-2011; second – 2011-2013). I took that as a sign that my writing had something to it. I carried on tweaking the novel. Then in 2014, Fox & Raven publishers in SA had a call for...

My latest short story, The Girl with Two Bodies , was published this week at The Kalahari Review. A story about functioning in a world not made for you, finding your place in the world within and not just the world outside yourself. Read it online: https://kalaharireview.com/the-girl-with-two-bodies-b6b6093f8012

My short story, Inktober , in eerie company in this latest anthology. Check it out. 👻 Stories by: Brett Rex Bruton, Janine Milne, Stephen Embleton, William Burger, Shaun van Rensburg, Livingston Edwards, Lester Walbrugh, Jessica Liebenberg, Erhu Amreyan, Toby Bennett, Mignotte Mekuria, and Blaize M Kaye. Bloody Parchment: Remains of an Old World offers you a selection of fantastical and sometimes downright unsettling tales that will drag you to dark places, in settings real or imagined. Find out more here:  https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/42831876-bloody-parchment?fbclid=IwAR03oLwlBDvuycbDgk0-23sRV2fD1SoF5ifKNG8_0NfOwy19okbp9AvNfTg

 (9 November 2018) 24 December 1945 – 3 November 2018 Pat Embleton was first and foremost my mother – that is how I saw her early on – but as I grew older, I came to see who she was in the world – and over the past week, who she was to all of you. And it is this dichotomy, for me, the person of contrasts that I got to experience over the past 44 years. She was firm, resolute, and sturdy like cobblestone, while at the same time, soft, and malleable like the sand used to take hold of the stones and keep her path firm. Contrasts. Opposites. Paving her way. She was born, Patricia Anne Fletcher, and although born in Newcastle Upon Tyne, in England she was a South African woman. She was an only child, who embraced the world. Her working class parents were a contrast in themselves: her gentle natured father who survived Dunkirk, and her mother, a strong-willed and accomplished woman in her own right. Her sons, Michael and I, are a contrast, each with differing characteristics she admired ...

Geoff Ryman's comprehensive and ongoing project, 100 Writers of African SFF , made it to Durban's shores in 2016. He interviewed myself and Blaize Kaye (Durban), and Unathi Magubeni (East London). Check out Part 11: http://strangehorizons.com/issue/100-african-writers-of-sff-part-eleven-south-africa/ My interview: http://strangehorizons.com/non-fiction/stephen-embleton/

In April 2018 we launched the cltrSHIFT (Culture Shift) podcast. With 12 episodes done, we've covered topics from Sangomas to Surfers, House Music to African Literature. The cltrShift mission: Delve into different cultures, mythos, traditional beliefs, histories, creative arts, identities and traditions of groups of people to shift perceptions and reveal our individuality as well as our collective humanity. AVAILABLE ON ALL MAJOR PODCAST PLATFORMS SoundCloud iTunes Stitcher Google Play TuneIn ACast Anchor Pocket Casts Castbox.fm From the site: I started many of these chats out of my own interest and my own research. Me and my audio recorder. And I soon realized that is was information that was well worth sharing. So with a bit more effort I created CltrShift. Some interviews may simply be out of interest, while others form a part of my writing research. Having had a number of my short stories published, I’ve found m...