Suzette Haden Elgin

Suzette Haden Elgin was born in Missouri in 1936. In the late 60s she found herself widowed, re-married, a mother of five and a graduate student in the linguistics department at the University of California, San Diego. Suzette began writing science fiction novels to pay her tuition. On completing her PhD, she became the only student ever to have to write two dissertations (one on English, one on Navajo) for that purpose; she went on to teach linguistics at San Diego State University, and then retired in 1980 to the Arkansas Ozarks, where she can still be found. 

Her first novel, The Communipaths, was published as half of an "ACE double" in 1970, starting her Coyote Jones series. (That's "Coyote" with three syllables.) Her second Coyote Jones book, Furthest, was published as an Ace Science Fiction Special in 1971; the third in the series, Star-Anchored, Star-Angered was published by DAW Books. Next came The Ozark Trilogy -- Twelve Fair Kingdoms, The Grand Jubilee, and Then There'll Be Fireworks, in 1981.