Bad Neighbors: Short Stories

by Reena Shah

An evocative collection about the gap between the people we aspire to be and our flawed realities from “a radiant new voice” (Megha Majumdar).

Both expansive and intimate, Bad Neighbors follows protagonists who strive to be the parents, lovers, siblings, friends, and children they’d like to be. Yet, jealousy or pride so often leads them astray, revealing how hard it is to care well for the people we love.

In “Floaters,” a woman grieves her sister while confronting all the ways in which she silently competed with her; in the title story, a couple confronts the problems in their marriage as they search for their lost dogs; in “Beasts,” a neurodivergent teen recalls his last ordinary night with his brother and mother before they learned of her terminal illness.

Playful, surprising, and confident, Bad Neighbors is an exquisite collection for readers of Lucia Berlin, Aysegül Savas, and Samantha Hunt.

Genres: Short Stories

256 pages, Hardcover

Expected publication March 23, 2027

About the author

Reena Shah is a writer, editor, and teacher. Her work has been featured in the Masters Review, Electric Literature, Joyland, BBC, the American Prospect, National Geographic, and the Guardian, among other publications. She has been awarded fellowships and residencies from the Martha Heasley Cox Center for Steinbeck Studies, Millay Arts, Tin House, Sustainable Arts Foundation, Cuttyhunk Island Residency, and the Fulbright Foundation. She received an MFA in fiction from the Michener Center for Writers, where she won the Keene Prize for Literature. For many years she was a kathak dancer in New York and India. She now lives on Roosevelt Island, NY with her family and teaches in a public school.