Deborah Taffa’s debut, Whiskey Tender, a 2024 National Book Award Finalist, was also a 2025 Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Nonfiction longlisted title. Named one of 2024’s Top 10 books by The Atlantic, Audible, and Time Magazine, her debut was also included on best and notable lists at The New Yorker, Elle, Esquire, NPR, The Washington Post, and Publisher’s Weekly. With awards and grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, PEN America, MacDowell, the Ellen Meloy Foundation, and the NY Summer Writers Institute, Deborah received her MFA in Iowa City. Her work can be found at many outlets, including PBS, Salon, The HuffPost, The Best American Nonrequired Reading, The LA Review of Books, and A Public Space. A citizen of the Kwatsaan Nation and Laguna Pueblo, she is the director of the MFA CW program at the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, NM. Prior to her job directing the MFA CW program at IAIA, Deborah served as an Executive Board Member with the Missouri Humanities Council where she was instrumental in creating a Native American Heritage Program in the state of Missouri. Finally, Deborah is editor emeritus of the literary magazine, River Styx.
