Navy Veteran Returns to Writing with a Tale of Two Siblings Set on the Streets of Fredericksburg
United States, 30th Jun 2026 – A Red-tailed Hawk circles above an old white house on Sophia Street, and a brother and sister discover what they’re willing to do for each other and the creatures they love in Nini & Connor: The Tale of the Hawk, a new illustrated children’s book by V. Lambinicio Jr.
The story begins with a small act of kindness. Eight-year-old Nini nursed an injured squirrel named Jack back to health the summer before, and she has cared for him and his scurry ever since. When a hawk marks their garden as hunting ground, Nini and her four-year-old brother Connor set out to protect Jack, turning to the town library, a homemade scarecrow, and eventually an unlikely defender: Juno, the family’s fat, lazy orange tabby, who proves far braver and faster than anyone expected.
But the heart of the book is the bond between the siblings themselves. Connor’s shout from the back door saves the first squirrel. His decision to let the cats out turns the final confrontation. And the story closes not with the hawk, but with a handwritten note Nini slips under her sleeping brother’s pillow, a promise that he is her brother forever. The kindness that began with one injured squirrel runs through every relationship in the book, and the courage the children find comes from loyalty to each other.
“I wanted to write the kind of story a child hears on a porch at dusk,” said Lambinicio. “Nini and Connor aren’t fearless. They’re scared the whole way through. But they love each other, and they love something small enough to need them, and that’s where real courage comes from.”
The Fredericksburg setting is more than a backdrop. The story moves through real corners of the old river town, from the library and the Riverfront Park playground to the City Dock on the Rappahannock, where George Washington’s boyhood home sits just across the water. Lambinicio sets all of his fiction in Fredericksburg.
Lambinicio’s path to publishing is an unusual one. The son of an editor and co-owner of a New York newspaper, he won his first writing prize, a Bible, in the fourth grade. A 20-year career in the U.S. Navy put his writing largely on hold. After retiring, he entered three stories in the 2024 Lorian Hemingway Short Story Contest, where his science fiction piece Ada earned an Honorable Mention. The Tale of the Hawk, written for that same contest, is the first to reach print, featuring classic watercolor-style illustrations throughout.
Nini & Connor: The Tale of the Hawk is available now in hardback, paperback, and e-book at www.niniandconnor.com.
Media contact:
Rocky Lambincio Jr.
Email address: nc.connection@niniandconnor.com
Website: www.niniandconnor.com
Company Details
Organization: N&C Engagement
Contact Person: Rocky Lambincio Jr.
Website: https://www.niniandconnor.com/
Email: Send Email
Country: United States
Release Id: 30062646640