Catherine Hiller

Catherine's latest novel, The Feud, was published in 2018 by Heliotrope Books. The story of work friends who become bitter enemies, the book is inspired by a feud at an office where Catherine worked for many years.

Betrayal by a woman friend is always bitter, but in this case the enmity leads to devastating romantic and reputational consequences. Nonetheless,  there's a certain comic ingenuity in how each woman plots the other's downfall. It's a sad story ... that may make you smile. Roberta drinks a lot of wine, and Nikki smokes a lot of weed, but can anything really help them find peace?  

 "Picture a mid-'90s, suburban New York office full of saleswomen, each successful, attractive, and competitive in her own way. Add boyfriends and sex, booze and drugs…and a spat between two of the women that soon becomes a knock-down, drag-out war. Welcome to Catherine Hiller's latest, a light, lively romp of a read that will have you turning pages faster than you can say flip phone or World Wide Web." 

—Cathi Hanauer, New York Times bestselling author of Gone and The Bitch is Back

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In 2018, Catherine edited her mother's sensational memoir, Passport to Paris. Catherine has worked as a freelance editor for fifteen years and welcomes new clients (see Editing tab).   

On Mother's Day, 2016, Catherine's essay about her mother appeared in the the New York Times Sunday Review. Catherine regards it as a short story that happens to be true. 

Catherine Hiller began writing in a diary when she was ten and now has dozens of spiral-bound journals, which she never rereads. She grew up in Greenwich Village and Park Slope and attended Hunter College High School, Brooklyn College, and Sussex University. She has a Ph.D. in English from Brown University.

Her first published piece, about gender role reversal in The Way We Were, appeared in the New York Times. Soon after, she published two books for children: Argentaybee and the Boonie and Abracatabby (both Coward, McCann).

She then started publishing fiction for adults (see Works Page), often about unconventional love. After her third novel, she became interested in documentary film making.

She is the co-producer/co-director, with Robert Richter, of Do Not Enter: The Visa War Against Ideas, about the McCarran Walter Act, which made it difficult for politically left wing foreigners such as Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Carlos Fuentes, and Dario Fo (all of whom are in the film) to visit the US. The film aired on PBS and was shown to members of Congress. It received a Blue Ribbon at the American Film and Video Festival.

Catherine also co-produced and co-directed, with Regina Weinreich, Paul Bowles: The Complete Outsider, a portrait film about the American writer and composer, author of The Sheltering Sky. The film premiered at the Museum of Modern Art and was released theatrically in 20 cities. Broadcast on the Sundance Channel, the film was called “spell-binding” by the New York Post. The Washington Post said it was “a fabulous film. You want to see it again and again.”

Hiller’s next book returned to the subject of passion. Her story collection, Skin: Sensual Tales (Carroll & Graf), was praised by John Updike and includes the story "Bad Sex," which was published in an anthology of that title. 

Her novel The Adventures of Sid Sawyer takes Mark Twain’s Adventures of Tom Sawyer—and turns it upside down. Told from the point of view of Tom’s sissy half-brother Sid, we get a whole new angle on this beloved classic.

Her non-fiction book, Just Say Yes: A Marijuana Memoir, created something of a stir. The first chapter was published as a Private Lives piece in the New York Times. This was followed by a profile about her in the Times in April 2015. For about a year, she wrote many pieces about cannabis, some of which she cross-posted on Huffington Post.