Dr. Melissa Chadburn
@melissachadburn.bsky.social
author and recovering journalist, debut novel A Tiny Upward Shove (@fsgbooks April 2022) my mother taught me how to sharpen a pencil with a knife and I’ve basically been doing that ever since.
All I knew was that I was participating in the thing I’d wanted my entire life—and yet I was somehow failing at it, or at least failing to express how badly I wanted it, when it was the Want itself that had me caught like a rabbit in headlights.-https://adimagazine.com/articles/tilting-at-windmills/
October 28, 2025 at 8:57 PM
All I knew was that I was participating in the thing I’d wanted my entire life—and yet I was somehow failing at it, or at least failing to express how badly I wanted it, when it was the Want itself that had me caught like a rabbit in headlights.-https://adimagazine.com/articles/tilting-at-windmills/
Reposted by Dr. Melissa Chadburn
"It’s in the fissures, and the resistance, the all around mess where the real learning takes place."
@melissachadburn.bsky.social's essay "Tilting at Windmills," about day laborers in LA County, activism, and academia, is out today from Adi.
Read here: adimagazine.com/articles/til...
@melissachadburn.bsky.social's essay "Tilting at Windmills," about day laborers in LA County, activism, and academia, is out today from Adi.
Read here: adimagazine.com/articles/til...
Tilting at Windmills
It’s the beginning of the semester, and fifteen of my students, from all over the country—also one from China and another from Korea—sit in a small bungalow trailer situated in the parking lot of a bu...
adimagazine.com
October 28, 2025 at 8:36 PM
"It’s in the fissures, and the resistance, the all around mess where the real learning takes place."
@melissachadburn.bsky.social's essay "Tilting at Windmills," about day laborers in LA County, activism, and academia, is out today from Adi.
Read here: adimagazine.com/articles/til...
@melissachadburn.bsky.social's essay "Tilting at Windmills," about day laborers in LA County, activism, and academia, is out today from Adi.
Read here: adimagazine.com/articles/til...
In reading my students' work I'm noticing a trend. Though the majority of my students are brunette, blonde blue eyed characters are the platonic ideal in their fiction. I wonder if it's because this is true of the majority of the stories they've read or if it's a reflection of popular culture...
October 26, 2025 at 2:01 PM
In reading my students' work I'm noticing a trend. Though the majority of my students are brunette, blonde blue eyed characters are the platonic ideal in their fiction. I wonder if it's because this is true of the majority of the stories they've read or if it's a reflection of popular culture...
got to hear Claudia Rankine read from her forthcoming book Triage last week. What a joy: tsl.news/a-night-with...
A night with Claudia Rankine: Grief, collapse and ‘Triage’ - The Student Life
On Oct. 15, acclaimed poet, playwright and essayist, Claudia Rankine, read excerpts from her upcoming book “Triage” to the Claremont community. Rankine’s writing often touches on the intimate fault li...
tsl.news
October 25, 2025 at 6:45 PM
got to hear Claudia Rankine read from her forthcoming book Triage last week. What a joy: tsl.news/a-night-with...
today is the day of Whiting sadness for me...
October 22, 2025 at 8:28 PM
today is the day of Whiting sadness for me...
Hello from Whidbey Island...
August 16, 2025 at 7:25 PM
Hello from Whidbey Island...
i discovered this incredible story by @samjmiller.bsky.social when perusing Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy in prepping for my courses next semester. www.thedarkmagazine.com/if-someone-y...
If Someone You Love Has Become a Vurdalak - The Dark Magazine
My brother on my front porch wailing my name, soaking wet and without a jacket in the cold spring rain, with nowhere else in the world to go, wondering why I won’t let him in. My brother crashing at o...
www.thedarkmagazine.com
August 8, 2025 at 1:51 PM
i discovered this incredible story by @samjmiller.bsky.social when perusing Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy in prepping for my courses next semester. www.thedarkmagazine.com/if-someone-y...
Read this perfect story today. Thrilled to teach it to my students next semester. Thanks @stephcha.bsky.social and @blacktopkid.bsky.social for your excellent selections in BAMS southwestreview.com/volume-108-n...
My Savage Year | Jordan Harper
From the Magazine
southwestreview.com
July 31, 2025 at 5:05 PM
Read this perfect story today. Thrilled to teach it to my students next semester. Thanks @stephcha.bsky.social and @blacktopkid.bsky.social for your excellent selections in BAMS southwestreview.com/volume-108-n...
'Exoriare aliquis nostris ex ossibus ultor'-Virgil
July 20, 2025 at 4:02 PM
'Exoriare aliquis nostris ex ossibus ultor'-Virgil
Reposted by Dr. Melissa Chadburn
Reposting this and a few other things for no particular reason today. Maybe I’ll do it tomorrow and the next day, too.
July 19, 2025 at 2:27 PM
Reposting this and a few other things for no particular reason today. Maybe I’ll do it tomorrow and the next day, too.
Love this prose by Miriam Toews in @parisreview.bsky.social
July 12, 2025 at 2:38 PM
Love this prose by Miriam Toews in @parisreview.bsky.social
Reposted by Dr. Melissa Chadburn
What they aren’t showing on Fox News
June 12, 2025 at 12:15 AM
What they aren’t showing on Fox News
Reposted by Dr. Melissa Chadburn
BREAKING: A few minutes ago, a vehicle of three people was rammed by a truck belonging to federal immigration authorities in Boyle Heights, CA. According to security footage shown to me, they deployed chemical munitions & detained the driver at gunpoint. All are US citizens according to the wife.
June 11, 2025 at 6:00 PM
BREAKING: A few minutes ago, a vehicle of three people was rammed by a truck belonging to federal immigration authorities in Boyle Heights, CA. According to security footage shown to me, they deployed chemical munitions & detained the driver at gunpoint. All are US citizens according to the wife.
Got a book length or longer project you'd like feedback on? I'm offering manuscript consultations over summer break: www.melissachadburn.com/consultations/
Consultations – Melissa
www.melissachadburn.com
June 11, 2025 at 2:35 AM
Got a book length or longer project you'd like feedback on? I'm offering manuscript consultations over summer break: www.melissachadburn.com/consultations/
I concluded this because these days, U.S. federal agents cover their faces, don’t produce identification, and won’t respond even when you ask them who they are. Living in a city of actors, I recognize their Method-style commitment to the neo-Gestapo role. www.zocalopublicsquare.org/i-went-to-fi...
I Went to Find Trump's 'Rebellion.' I Ended up at a Birthday Party | Connecting California
Reporting in Compton and Paramount on Saturday, I Saw Nothing That Justified Sending in the National Guard
www.zocalopublicsquare.org
June 9, 2025 at 1:24 PM
I concluded this because these days, U.S. federal agents cover their faces, don’t produce identification, and won’t respond even when you ask them who they are. Living in a city of actors, I recognize their Method-style commitment to the neo-Gestapo role. www.zocalopublicsquare.org/i-went-to-fi...
Looking forward to doing this @dykestorytelling event @dynastytr.bsky.social on June 21st!
June 2, 2025 at 12:45 AM
Looking forward to doing this @dykestorytelling event @dynastytr.bsky.social on June 21st!
What a delightful night, and leave it to Ocean Vuong to sit before a packed house, extending the admiration and recognition to @tonyamosley.bsky.social, who was also such an insightful interlocutor. I woke up today motivated with a full spirit. People are alright.
May 30, 2025 at 3:17 PM
What a delightful night, and leave it to Ocean Vuong to sit before a packed house, extending the admiration and recognition to @tonyamosley.bsky.social, who was also such an insightful interlocutor. I woke up today motivated with a full spirit. People are alright.
"I slept with a human Ed Hardy shirt."—@jeanho66.bsky.social
in her delightfully funny and moving story Kiki and Tombu in The Sewanee Review.
in her delightfully funny and moving story Kiki and Tombu in The Sewanee Review.
May 30, 2025 at 3:10 PM
"I slept with a human Ed Hardy shirt."—@jeanho66.bsky.social
in her delightfully funny and moving story Kiki and Tombu in The Sewanee Review.
in her delightfully funny and moving story Kiki and Tombu in The Sewanee Review.
This essay by Hanif Abdurraqib on despair is such a stunner. www.newyorker.com/culture/essa... Also reminds me of a quote from Laurel Fantauzzo's The First Impulse, "Grief tinged amusement is a most Filipino condition." Malaise is my preferred affect. I love to swim around the slow thick of malaise.
In Defense of Despair
The feeling is most commonly framed as an end point, a level of despondency that cannot be overcome. But it doesn’t have to be so.
www.newyorker.com
May 28, 2025 at 4:38 PM
This essay by Hanif Abdurraqib on despair is such a stunner. www.newyorker.com/culture/essa... Also reminds me of a quote from Laurel Fantauzzo's The First Impulse, "Grief tinged amusement is a most Filipino condition." Malaise is my preferred affect. I love to swim around the slow thick of malaise.
Reposted by Dr. Melissa Chadburn
