I was born in Genoa, Italy, and raised in Erie, Pennsylvania. I served eleven years in the United States Air Force, including a tour during Desert Storm. After my military service, life took me through many chapters and through all of them, one thing never changed: my love for the outdoors.

I love camping. I love hiking. I love the smell of pine trees on a cool morning and the sound of leaves crunching underfoot in October. I love the way a forest feels like a whole world unto itself full of stories, full of life, full of questions just waiting to be asked.

That love is what became The Mystery of Hidden Oak Valley.

When I sat down to write this book, I didn’t just want to write an adventure story. I wanted to write the book I would have liked as a child, a book that made me feel like the forest was a place I belonged, not just a place I walked through. A book that gave me the names of things. Because when you know the name of something, you notice it differently. You see it. You care about it.

I also wanted to write a book that a parent and child could read together and then go outside and actually use. When you finish The Mystery of Hidden Oak Valley, I want your family to go for a walk and say, “That’s a birch tree! Look at that bark!” I want your child to ask why the marigolds are planted next to the tomatoes. I want them to look at a pine cone and pick it up and hold it, knowing now what it is and where it came from.

Education and adventure are not opposites. In the best stories, they are the same thing. That’s what I believe. That’s what Hickory believes too.

Thank you for reading. Thank you for your curiosity. And thank you for raising children who still look up at the trees and wonder.

 Franco Tompeterini

Author & President, Curious Readers LLC.

Rogers, Arkansas

The Mystery of Hidden Oak Valley is available now on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Google Books, and other major publishing platforms.