Hillary Behrman’s award winning short stories have been described as deeply humane and unsettling and have been published in journals, magazines, short story dispensers and an anthology. Lake Effect, her debut collection of stories was chosen by Lauren Groff as the winner of the 2024 Mary McCarthy Prize for Short Fiction and will be published by Sarabande Books in 2026. Groff praised Lake Effect as a book of “great moral power and heart” by “an author of extraordinary grace.” Hillary is a recipient of the Chris O’Malley Prize in Fiction from The Madison Review. She has an MFA in fiction from Pacific University and was a participant in fiction at the Bread Loaf Writers Conference. She’s been a writer in residence at the National Willa Cather Center and an artist in residence at the Vashon Artist Residency. Hillary lives and writes in Seattle where she raised two kids and worked as a children’s civil rights lawyer and public defender. She’s excited to be a part of the Jack Straw Writers Program and is working on her first novel.

2025 Writers Program