Dear Living Legends,

A long time ago, perhaps among ancestral lands far away, the very thing we held in common—in community—was oral storytelling.

Oral storytelling offered us intimacy—where audiences and storytellers blended blood and bone through physical closeness and proximity. Circular seating reflected the cyclical nature of land and time all around us. Stories were malleable and flexible to meet needs. Bonds were braided by inclusion in a loose creative process that could infinitely reshape stories like a multiverse: an empowering type of agency.

For those of us who may be or feel distanced from this practice, let’s wander together—wonder—into how we might reclaim and relearn this shared language as a part of our present, not our past…

Both oral storytelling and writing coexist in this book—one is not privileged above the other. This book blends the two with practices of graphic novels and picture books, sharing the actual Legend of Unsinkable while weaving you into its present-day form.

Out in the world, we know there’s an endless supply of writing work- books, mostly curated as writing advice for aspiring or current professional writers.

But the purpose of gathering and finding words—like rock, stone, and shell on a beach—need not be creating in any particular form. Which rocks have a comforting texture? Which stones catch your eye? Which shells can you hear a story inside?

Words can simply be words—in any way that supports us or our people. And this is often the hardest part when we glance across the vast oceanscape of our lives and experiences.