While Holladay has written widely and helpfully on other topics, his intensive work on the prophet Jeremiah remains one of the most important contributions to the study of that book, and especially to our understanding of the prophet Jeremiah in relation to the book ascribed to him.

In Jeremiah: Reading the Prophet in His Time and Ours, Holladay seeks to connect the message of the book of Jeremiah 'to the life and experiences of the prophet and his times. No one in contemporary Jeremiah studies has worked as assiduously at that enterprise.' from the Foreword by Patrick D. Miller