Book Review of "Whiskey Tender" written by Deborah Jackson Taffa by Bhavna Mehta
Book Review of “Whiskey Tender” written by Deborah Jackson Taffa
by Bhavna Mehta
Deborah Taffa’s sweeping memoir “Whiskey Tender” brims with life. And death. And dreams.
Icama, as Taffa explains early in the book, is a core belief of the Quechuan people in Southwest America. It is a respect and belief that one’s dreams can act as a guide towards civic responsibility, personal goals, spiritual power, as well as an interaction with the souls of the dead.
At the beginning of Part 1, Taffa sets up the present context of being fifty years old, driving with her father to her mother’s funeral, and falling “into a sandstorm dream.” They are going home to their reservation in Yuma, CA, where Taffa and her family lived during her early childhood. As I read, I too fell into the dream of the book, the characters came alive as they protected and pulled away from each other; as the journeys towards and away from home were immersion in cultures, neighborhoods, towns, and their ancient and urban ways; as dreams weaved in and out of a physical and material reality that invited me in and stunned me with its vividness. Life and death intertwine and sadness looms and envelopes. Full of specificity and immediacy, the book is about family, colonialism, the extractionary harshness of whiteness, the struggle of communities to stay together and not knowing what helps or hinders that togetherness. Overall, there is no turning away from the wrenching realities of living on and away from a family’s ancestral land.
This is a coming-of-age memoir spanning the time from Taffa’s birth to her graduating from high school in Farmington, NM in the 1980s. Her father is Quechan/Laguna and her mother is Hispanic; both come from families with deep roots in New Mexico. Taffa is a magical storyteller. She resurrects, for the reader, the large families on both sides—full of siblings, cousins, aunts, uncles, and grandparents that both her parents bring into their union. There are differences in religious practices, although Taffa’s paternal grandmother who held a mixture of tribal and Christian beliefs gives an insight into how they can be merged into a spiritual life. As she grows, Taffa encounters and confronts spaces and individuals where religion plays a central role. She goes to a convent school where nuns and other teachers hold on to the punitive power of Christianity over the native communities. As a child, she attended a funeral after the early and tragic death of her uncle and aunt where the ceremony in the Cry House and the cremation of bodies over the cottonwood branches reminded me of my own family’s Hindu practice of mourning. Taffa’s mother is a devout Catholic who says the rosary and takes her little girls to mass every morning but also ignores the wisdom of the native ways that Taffa seeks out.
Taffa’s father is a mighty presence in the book. She is honest and clear about his difficult beginnings, his run-ins with the law, and his time in jail when he was a teenager. As the book progresses, he trains to be a welder, gets a stable job at the Four Corners power plant, and becomes the first Indian foreman in the history of the plant. He coaches softball when Taffa and her siblings are younger, exposes the kids to contemporary culture, tells them stories of growing up rough on the Yuma reservation, and as she grows, encourages Taffa to make her own choices and to figure out what it means for her to be an individual. He is sharp, tough, and grounded but also kind and supportive.
Throughout, we see the Southwest landscape through Taffa’s eyes – the Colorado River that runs through the Yuma reservation, the Animas River where her family goes fishing, the cacti and sage plants, the sandstone lands and the desert canyons, the ravens and eagles, juniper and cottonwood trees, the sun rising over the bluffs and boulders. As a teenager, she gets up early and hikes in her favorite canyon by herself. I loved to imagine her walking and thinking about all that she was beginning to confront in her young life. In addition to the angst most youngsters feel, Taffa has a lot coming at her from different directions – a deep longing to learn from her ancestors and to help with the Quechan community, a need for friendship with native people her age, a desire to puzzle out the intersections of history and country, wrestling with how she could speak up about injustice.
Late in the book, Taffa has a dream while driving back home with her family, after her sister survives a terrible car accident. She writes about the dream: “...my ancestors were running across the desert. They were leaping over washes and climbing up boulders with supernatural speed—and they were pulling me alongside them. At first, I thought we were trying to escape, but then I realized we were running toward rather than away, and the dream became beautiful.”
Of course, this widely recognized book belongs in classrooms and curriculums, homes, and libraries. This book should be read, taught, gifted, shared, and heard. There is an audio version in the lyrical voice of Charley Flyte, an Oglala Lakota and Mohawk artist. It also belongs to another place I would not have thought of if I hadn’t read it as an immigrant from India who has lived in America for decades. Before swearing an oath of allegiance to the United States to become a citizen, I did not need to study or know anything about Indigenous history. I believe that “Whiskey Tender” would be an excellent accompaniment to the Naturalization Test study guide. Reading this book created for me a broader and clearer view of my adopted country, its government, and its citizens.
Deborah Taffa is now the director of the MFA in Creative Writing Program at the Institute of American Indian Arts which hosts the Chapter House Journal. Her leadership and mentorship point towards writing as a pathway to tell stories on our own terms. Her book is a guide as well, showing how the traumas and joys of childhood and family exist alongside the larger narrative of the world.
