Reena Shah

About Reena

Reena is a fiction writer, journalist, editor, teacher, and mother of two. She began her career as an educator in New York City public schools and went on to teach at and develop schools in India. In 2018, she and her family moved from Brooklyn, New York, to Monteverde, Costa Rica, where she pursued writing full time, working on a novel and on feature stories about climate change, the environment, and politics. Reena also serves as a coach for a forest ecologist who is writing a memoir. Her stories and articles have been featured in Electric Literature, The American Prospect, The Guardian, and National Geographic, among other publications. Her fiction has earned her a wide range of fellowships and residences, including from Sustainable Arts Foundation and the Fulbright Foundation.

In a previous life, Reena was a dancer of kathak, a classical Indian form, an experience that profoundly influences her approach to writing and teaching. “As a writer, I remind myself that my daily practice is rehearsal, not performance. In rehearsal, it’s easier to take risks and discover a story over time. I love helping students see that they don’t have to perform when they write, which often allows their voices to shine through.” Reena now lives with her family in Austin, Texas, where she’s a fellow at the Michener Center for Writers, and from where she guides Hillside students to release their performance anxiety and have fun in rehearsal.