About My Work

I write speculative fiction that drifts between the psychological and the uncanny. Stories about what we fear, what we dream, and what lies just beneath the surface of being human. My work focuses on interior experience: how memory, perception, imagination, and emotion shape reality, and how the familiar can become quietly, disturbingly strange.

I use speculative and surreal elements not necessarily always as spectacle, but as extensions of inner life, ways of giving form to what is hidden, repressed, or difficult to articulate. My stories often begin in the ordinary: a room, a moment, a thought, and then tilt, almost imperceptibly, toward something slightly off.

Visual art is deeply intertwined with my writing practice. I often sketch, create collages, and gather images as a way of thinking through stories and entering their emotional landscapes. Music, too, forms part of that imaginative space. I immerse myself in different sounds and atmospheres while writing, allowing image, emotion, memory, and narrative to blur together as a story slowly emerges.

I am drawn to moments of transition: the thresholds between childhood and adulthood, waking and dreaming, life and death, love and heartbreak, connection and isolation. These liminal spaces allow me to explore how comfort and fear coexist, how something can feel familiar and threatening at once, and how we are both drawn to and unsettled by the unknown.

Much of my work engages with the numinous quality of everyday life, the sense that something larger, or less visible exists beneath the surface of ordinary experience. I explore the tensions between consciousness and the subconscious, self and other, reality and dream, desire and loss.

I write from the belief that human interiority is both profoundly meaningful and, at times, deeply unnerving, and that the most compelling stories emerge in the space where emotion, imagination, and reality begin to blur.

My stories often tend toward ambiguity and atmosphere, favoring resonance over resolution. I am less interested in explaining the uncanny than in evoking it, creating narratives that linger like a half-remembered dream and invite the reader to confront what lies beneath their own surface.

Who am I?

The Short Bio:

Marinda Kotze is a South African writer and research psychologist living in Tbilisi, Georgia. She writes speculative fiction that drifts between the psychological and the uncanny—stories about what we fear, what we dream, and what lies just beneath the surface of being human. Marinda writes in both English and Afrikaans.

Her influences include a wide range of authors such as Stephen King, Shirley Jackson, Ray Bradbury, Kurt Vonnegut, Neil Gaiman, Philip K. Dick, Aldous Huxley, and Edgar Allan Poe, as well as filmmakers Tim Burton and David Lynch.

Her Afrikaans short story “Krisjan se Meisies” was shortlisted by PEN Afrikaans and LitNet for their short story competition celebrating the centenary of the Afrikaans language. Three of her stories have also been finalists in Crystal Lake Publishing’s Shallow Waters horror flash fiction contests.

Marinda’s work has appeared in numerous literary magazines and anthologies, including Dark Moments (Black Hare Press), The Mythos Minute Podcast, 50-Word Stories, Flash of the Dead: Reloaded (Wicked Shadow Press), Dark Descent Magazine (Dark Holme Publishing), The World of Myth Magazine, Mobius Blvd. Magazine, and Schlock! Magazine.

The Long Bio (aka The Origin Story):

As an introvert, I always feel a little self-conscious introducing myself. But here it goes…

I’m Marinda Kotze. I’m from Pretoria, South Africa. I travel a lot and currently find myself in the Republic of Georgia. My first language is Afrikaans, but I’ve always enjoyed reading and writing in English.

I am a Research Psychologist with a BSocSci degree in Psychology (minoring in Criminology), an honors degree in Psychology, a Master’s degree in Research Psychology, and a PhD in Psychology.

I pursued psychology because I found human behavior—especially criminal behavior and addiction—fascinating. Initially, I wanted to become a clinical psychologist. But after working as a research assistant in my university’s psychology department and conducting my own research projects, I realized I was better suited to research than clinical practice. I was drawn to research because it involved a lot of reading and writing, was intellectually stimulating, and offered something new with every project. That seemed far more exciting than being a therapist!

After completing my PhD, life returned to “normal.” In the process of recalibrating my daily routines, I started reading a lot more fiction. While visiting my parents, my mother reminded me that I used to write when I was younger—and that, originally, I had dreamed of becoming a writer. That was true, but by my teenage years, I had given up on the idea due to discouraging feedback from teachers and lack of self-confidence. Still, I continued making up stories in my overactive imagination and lived vicariously through the characters I encountered in books, movies, and television shows.

As an adult, I spent a lot of time writing research reports and articles, so I assumed any skill I had for fiction writing had long since disappeared. However, with some extra free time—and encouragement from my boyfriend—I decided to give fiction writing another try.

I started writing short stories to learn the craft of storytelling. Since I’m a horror, fantasy and science fiction fan, I naturally gravitated toward those genres. From the beginning, I decided to submit my stories to magazines rather than to write in my own little bubble.

My first submission was to The First Line magazine on July 27, 2023. The story, Candlesticks and Covenants, was rejected (the first of many!), but I didn’t let that stop me. I revised it, sent it elsewhere—and it was accepted! (It should be out sometime in 2026) That small victory gave me the momentum to keep going.

I continued writing and submitting short stories to magazines and participating in competitions whenever possible. So far, over twenty of my short stories have been published or are on their way to publication.

I’ve recently decided to pivot more towards writing longer fiction, so expect novellas, novels and serialised stories from me in the near future!

When I’m not writing, I love reading (obviously!), sketching, listening to music, watching movies, playing video and board games, hanging out with friends, and exploring new and interesting places (always with a notebook and a pen close at hand).

Whether you’re a fellow writer, reader, or just passing through—thank you for being here. I hope you find something in my stories that makes you feel seen, thrilled, or maybe just a little unsettled…

Subscribe to my mailing lists: