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What if the spirits never left? Whether you’re drawn to Indigenous fiction, urban fantasy, or cultural memoir, Modern Natives is an unforgettable journey through myth, memory, and modern identity.

Four of the five stories in the richly illustrated Modern Natives contain traditional myths. Within those short stories, Grant creates new characters and brings the myths into the contemporary world. The Isle of Women is one short story Grant is particularly proud of and feels connected to. The myth is about the sacred Isle of Women, a secret Gulf Island between Valdez and Vancouver Island where women go “when they need to replenish their magic.” The island is forbidden to men and children. In the story, a young girl is abducted while walking home from a ceremony. To find the girl, three women and two teenage girls travel to the island and use their shapeshifting magic. The young girl is found, and the two college-age boys who abducted her are punished. Grant brings the tale into today’s context by including the stark statistics of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls.

Writer and multimedia artist Andrea Grant considers her newest literature offering, Modern Natives, An Illustrative Collection of Reimagined Coast Salish Myths, a “calling.” Almost a decade ago, Grant was gifted “amazing archival information” from her Coast Salish tribe, the Pune’luxutth’. The tribe primarily lives on lands in the Southern Gulf Islands and on Vancouver Island, B.C. The main community of Spune’luxutth is located on Penelakut Island. The communications manager gave Grant binders full of archaic stories and myths. He also put her in touch with Elder Thiyaus Florence James. Thiyaus acted as the cultural advisor for Modern Natives. Grant was tapped for the project based on her graphic creation Minx, an Indigenous woman and superhero featured in individual comics and stories in anthologies distributed at various Comic-Cons. She was given permission to be creative with the archival stories as a means to attract a new audience.

Andrea Grant grew up between worlds. As a Coast Salish woman shaped by both ancestral territory and urban life, she kept feeling ancestral stories surface in the middle of city streets, subway rides, and crowded apartments. Rather than see that as a contradiction, she turned it into a book… The book blends short fiction, poetry, and illustration, and was created with the knowledge and approval of Grant’s elders,” and “The collaboration with Elder Florence was ongoing and deeply reciprocal. Grant would send concepts, excerpts, and drafts for feedback throughout the writing process. Elder Florence taught her Coast Salish words and cultural nuances woven throughout the work and helped Grant understand which stories belonged to the community and which could be adapted for broader audiences… Grant is a recipient of multiple First Nations Storyteller grants from the Canada Council for the Arts, the BC Arts Council, and the First Peoples’ Cultural Council.

Rooted in deep cultural tradition, Modern Natives brings to life the ancient belief that the world is surrounded by supernatural beings who shape, challenge, and guide us. Unlike typical mythology books, these stories are not treated as fiction; they are sacred teachings and oral records offering insight into the laws of nature and the spiritual connections between all living things.

Andrea Grant’s latest book, Modern Natives: An Illustrated Collection of Reimagined Coast Salish Myths (Eaglespeaker Publishing) is a luminous, genre bending collection that brings the living myths of the Coast Salish peoples into sharp, contemporary focus. Grant blends ancestral teachings, vivid memory, and cinematic prose to breathe new life into three timeless stories…Literarily, the collection operates at the intersection of myth retelling, urban Indigenous fiction, and cultural memoir. Trickster figures navigate present-day cities, ancestral beings surface in modern landscapes, and the boundary between the spiritual and the everyday collapses, and Grant’s prose is cinematic and lyrical, exploring how oral tradition can be translated, rather than flattened within contemporary literary structures…Each story honors Coast Salish oral tradition while asserting Indigenous sovereignty over how our stories evolve, adapt, and continue.

Modern Natives: An Illustrated Collection of Reimagined Coast Salish Myths. This is the latest from Andrea Grant…this book is more than a reimagining of myths – some of the stories are interwoven with the experiences of the author… as a girl and in her young adulthood. Marvelous illustrations through and through as well,” and “I was pleased to discover some which explored and told of some Native American mythology, as well as a REALLY cool Edgar Allen Poe adaptation (to name just a couple. These were just like the Illustrated classics I fell in love with as a child). We also heard a bit about Minx, Andrea’s superhero alter-ego…

Modern Natives, is a beautifully illustrated book that reimagines Coast Salish stories within a contemporary world blending poetry, visual art, and cinematic storytelling into a form readers can hold, revisit, and return to. What began as a deeply personal exploration of identity and ancestry has grown into a living story world designed to move fluidly between page, screen, and voice.

Blending short fiction, poetry, and illustration, Modern Natives sees a world where the spirits never left: tricksters walk city streets, wolves appear under streetlights, and ancestral beings move through urban spaces. Grant, the recipient of First Nations Storyteller Grants, writes from lived experience, bridging territory, diaspora, ceremony and city life. Illustrations by acclaimed Coast Salish artist Qwalsius–Shaun Peterson and Bowera Studio, place the book as a collaboration rooted in Indigenous community. Created with the knowledge and approval of Grant’s elders and grounded in Coast Salish protocol and responsibility to story, the project began following a visit to Penelakut Island, where Grant’s tribe is from. There she was gifted access to archival materials and ancestral knowledge, which became the foundation and inspiration for the book.