"Mary Tall Mountain is a Koyukon Athabascan writer who was born on the Yukon  River(Alaska) and now resides in San Francisco, California. After working under Paula Gunn Allen, she began writing on her own in 1970. She is concerned with social justice and environmental issues in the United States. Her first published book, There Is No Word for Goodbye (1981), won the Pushcart Prize."