Poetry

Cookbook

Since 1935, the Valente family has made memories over food at their quaint seaside cottage in Downeast Maine. Every few years, the family produces a cookbook featuring their favorite recipes. The proceeds from the cookbooks go toward the upkeep of the cottage. Over the years, these have become somewhat of a collector's item among family and friends, with certain editions becoming highly sought after. In honor of the 90th anniversary of the cottage, we've redesigned and reprinted the very first edition of the cookbook. From our kitchen to yours, it's an honor to share these recipes with you. We hope you prepare these meals and share them with friends, family, and strangers.

Seldominn Cookbook: Recipes of the Valente Family & Friends

By Valente, Jenna

My love affair with writing all began in 1997 at a Scholastic Book Fair in Vancouver, Washington when I became the proud owner of my first diary, I mean, journal. Being a writer was not an option for me. The moment I had the tools at eight years old, the words started flowing out of me and haven’t stopped since. Well, except for those moments of agony known as creative droughts.

We won’t dwell on those times, though. Droughts are just as necessary as flow states, designed for refilling the creative cup until it spills over once again.

It is with a great deal of joy, vulnerability, and excitement that I present to you my first-ever published book of poetry.

Young Love or Something Like It

Some say love is a battlefield but for me, it's a rollercoaster. So fasten your seatbelt, sit back, and enjoy this poetic ride that spans over a decade of peaks and pitfalls of searching for love in all the wrong but feel oh-so-right places. Blazing through the world with a young mind and open heart ended up being a euphoric disaster filled with sweetness and shame, joy and pain. Fortunately for you, dear reader, I wrote it all down and came out on the other side haggard, grateful, and rewarded with the greatest lesson of all, the understanding that you must first love yourself before you can ever love anyone else. It is my pleasure to present to you my trials and tribulations of
Young Love or Something Like It.