WHISKEY TENDER A Memoir

Charley Flyte's performance of Deborah Taffa's memoir is beautifully nuanced and sensitive, and her ease with Indigenous names lends additional authenticity. As a child and teenager, Taffa struggled to understand her place in the world. When her parents moved off the Yuma reservation in search of better jobs, Taffa was cut off from her traditional family and culture. She was too white to fit into the local Navajo community and too Native for the white community. Taffa sprinkles in the history of land seizures and government injustice, linking that larger history with her personal experiences. Flyte smoothly captures Taffa's journey from confusion, loss, and discrimination at school to understanding the complicated mixed-tribe relationship of her parents and finding a sense of belonging and self-acceptance. A.B. © AudioFile 2024, Portland, Maine [Published: JULY 2024]