HIlal Isler

Author of
Har Mar: Stories (Northwestern University Press/Curbstone, 2026)

Hilal Isler teaches at the University of Texas, Austin. Her short fiction and essays have appeared in New York Magazine, The Believer, The Brooklyn Review, The Paris Review online, and elsewhere. She is author of the new story collection: Har Mar.

Instagram / Twitter / TikTok / hilalisler.com / Represented by Ayesha Pande

Books by HILAL

Har Mar: Stories (Northwestern University Press/Curbstone, 2026)

Journeying through the emotional migrations of women living in the in-between

In Hilal Isler’s gripping debut story collection, Har Mar, women in the early twenty-first century navigate the complex spaces between countries, families, languages, and selves. Isler’s characters are all on the verge of something―success, rebellion, revelation―and they want to disappear as much as they want to be seen. Moving back and forth between Turkey and the United States, these stories trace migrations both physical and emotional: a nanny plots to flee the wealthy family she cares for in the Grand Bazaar of Istanbul; in Har Mar, a quiet mall tucked in the suburbs of Minneapolis, a bookseller escapes her grief in a complicated relationship with a wig retailer; an actress is hired by a famous American novelist to portray her at public events.

The women in Har Mar don’t always make sound decisions, and they’re not trying to be heroes. But they are reaching―imperfectly, but fiercely―for connection, truth, and home. With moving prose and a deep sense of longing, this collection explores what it means to grow up in the margins, to live in translation, and to build a life at the edge of belonging.

PRAISE

“For short story lovers, this collection is bright and strange, following a broad range of characters between Turkey and the US, each of them navigating the rough edges of their lives in some profound way. Some of them are tied up in complex, intimate labor relations, while others face the unsettling and uncertain world of romance. An exciting debut collection!” —Mizna

“ Hilal Isler’s debut collection of short stories, Har Mar pokes at … murky intimacies with a forgiving scalpel. Nannies and servers, caretakers and mothers, writers and models all strive for something more in these stories, and the central question seems to be whether crossing some perimeter will bring their dream world into reality – or send the protagonist crashing into a nightmare.” —The Austin Chronicle

“It’s been a long time since I’ve read a collection of stories as honest, true, and wise as this one. I finished the stories of Har Mar feeling a lot less lonesome in the world. I loved this book.” —Vauhini Vara, author of This Is Salvaged: StoriesPraise