Halley frequently uses elements of memoir in relating the topics of her books to her own biography.[5] Her book about touching children, breastfeeding, children's sleep and contemporary childrearing advice, Boundaries of Touch: Parenting and Adult-Child Intimacy was published in July 2007 by the University of Illinois Press.[6] With Patricia Ticineto Clough, Halley coedited The Affective Turn: Theorizing the Social in 2007.[7] In "The Wire" her autoethnographic piece in that volume, Halley challenges traditional modes of storytelling that develop in linear fashion and that use binary oppositions as a way of describing or knowing the world.[8]
In 2011, she co-authored Seeing White: An Introduction to White Privilege and Race with Amy Eshleman and Ramya Vijaya.[9] A second edition came out in 2022.[10] Her fourth book The Parallel Lives of Women and Cows: Meat Markets was published in 2012 by Palgrave Macmillan.[11] In this book, Halley weaves together a social history of the American beef cattle industry, with her memoir of growing up in Wyoming in the shadow of her grandfather's cattle business.[5]
As a child and young adult, Halley spent much of her time horseback riding in the Rocky Mountains. Her book, Horse Crazy: Girls and the Lives of Horses[19] was published in 2019 with the University of Georgia Press explores the passion many girls have for horses. Most recently, in 2022, she coauthored The Roads to Hillbrow: Making Life in South Africa's Community of Migrants with Ron Nerio. Halley has won a number of awards for teaching and civic engagement.