her first book, "house of windows: portraits from a jerusalem neighborhood" (steerforth press, 2000, broadway books, 2002) consists of a series of linked essays about her north african jewish neighborhood in jerusalem. it was described by "kirkus reviews" as "steadily perceptive and brimming with informed passion." in 2009 yale university press brought out her "my happiness bears no relation to happiness: a poet's life in the palestinian century," a life and times of the palestinian poet taha muhammad ali. the first biography ever published about a palestinian writer, "my happiness" was awarded britain’s 2010 "jewish quarterly"-wingate prize and was named one of the best twenty books of 2009 by the "barnes & noble review" and one of the top ten biographies of the year by "booklist." writing in "the independent", boyd tonkin called it "a remarkable book… a triumph of personal empathy and historical insight and a beacon for anyone who believes that ‘more joins than separates us.’" a 2011 guggenheim foundation fellow, hoffman is married to macarthur-winning poet and translator peter cole, and in 2011, she and cole published a book they wrote together, "sacred trash: the lost and found world of the cairo geniza" (schocken /nextbook), which has been widely praised, with harold bloom calling it "a small masterpiece" and "the nation" describing it as "a literary jewel whose pages turn like those of a well-paced thriller, but with all the chiseled elegance and flashes of linguistic surprise we associate with poetry... "sacred trash" has made history both beautiful and exciting." in the jewish press, the "chicago jewish star" called it "captivating, with the drama of any good mystery… it has all the ingredients of a compelling work of fiction. except that it's true."