Reema

Reema Rao is a fiction writer. She is currently at work on a short story collection, from which individual stories have received the Story Foundation Prize, the Larry Brown Short Story Award, named a Best of the Net finalist, and nominated for the Pushcart Prize. Her writing can be read in Story, Witness, The Los Angeles Review, Hayden’s Ferry Review, Spread the Jelly, and elsewhere. She is a 2026 McCormack Writing Center (formerly Tin House) Scholar, a 2026 Periplus Finalist, a 2024-2025 Jennifer Weiner Fellow, and has been awarded the 2026 Harnisch Microgrant from The Rumpus and the 2026 Creative Accelerator Fund from the Illinois Arts Council. She lives in Chicago.