From the author’s foreword:
I hope, whatever else, I have accomplished in these stories—whether humorous or tragic—I have accomplished with grace and sensitivity.
I make no claims to know what Turning Wind is like these days. I make no claims to be an expert. Let me say as Spike Gerry said, there being no such thing as an expert in human beings, there is certainly no such thing as an American Indian expert. To say otherwise flings us once again into misconception and stereotype, from there to lampoon and parody. If I have done that, I would rather not have set pen to paper.