Bio: Melaina was born and raised in Bowie, Maryland, but has lived in the San Francisco Bay area for the last 10 years. Melaina began self-publishing comics at 7 years old and won an award for her first self-published comic in the second grade.

Her artistic inspirations have ranged from drawing, painting, sculpture, blogging, writing & publishing short story zines, making clothes, and knitting. However, in 2004, Melaina's dear friend MariNaomi invited her to paint at MariNaomi's studio. Given Melaina's joy of painting and her compulsion to write short stories and self-publish them in zines, MariNaomi talked her into trying her hand, once again, at comics.

Melaina's comics are autobiographical. Given her day-job profession, working with people who are dying, this subject-matter appears relatively frequently in her work.

Her self-published works include:

-Death, Dating & Other Disasters

-Dater's Dozen

-Bewildered Bisexual

-My Year of Celibacy

-Crash Course

Her comics have also appeared in anthologies: Not My Small Diary and Sunday Night Comics.