Alumna writes children’s book series with help of the FBI

Eisenstein got the idea for Hiding Carly while mentoring a fifth grade student who was participating in the FBI’s Junior Special Agent program. The program teaches participants non-violent behavior and responsible citizenship and helps them stay substance free.

It’s not every author who invites FBI agents to her book launch, but Ann Eisenstein did just that.

Eisenstein, an alumna of Wright State University, is the author of the new children’s book Hiding Carly, a thrilling tale of murder, mystery and the determination of one young boy to find justice.

Special agent Max Gray has been murdered, and the FBI has officially closed the case. It is up to Max’s 11-year-old son, Sean, to uncover the truth and determine the mysterious connection between his murdered father and Carly, the new girl in his class.

Eisenstein got the idea for Hiding Carly while mentoring a fifth grade student who was participating in the FBI’s Junior Special Agent program. The program teaches participants non-violent behavior and responsible citizenship and helps them stay substance free.

When Eisenstein published her book, she invited the former and current heads of the Junior Special Agents program to her book launch. The current program head was “so enamored with the story,” according to Eisenstein, “she forwarded my information about the book to the FBI headquarters in Washington, DC.”

Now, Eisenstein is cleared to work with the FBI on a series—Sean Gray, Junior Special Agent.

Eisenstein didn’t set out to become a writer. Though she has written all her life, it has always been mainly for pleasure. Originally, Eisenstein intended to get her bachelor’s in psychology. She changed her major several times during her undergrad years however, and ended up graduating with a degree in education from Miami University.

It wasn’t until she was deep into her teaching career that she began to consider psychology again.

“I had a lot of kids that really needed a lot of help,” she says. “It was part of the reason they weren’t succeeding at academics, because they had other issues that they were dealing with.”

Eisenstein went back to school, graduating from Wright State University in 1981 with her M.Ed. in school psychology.

However, it wasn’t until she retired and became a student mentor that she came in contact with the Junior Special Agents program and was inspired to write Hiding Carly.

Eisenstein says that while many children’s books don’t deal with issues that concern children, Hiding Carly features events that strike at the core of children’s issues.

“It deals with scenes of friendship and family and separation and loss,” she says. “It deals with bullying. It deals with kidnapping. And those are things that affect kids today across the nation; across the world, really.”

Whether writing, teaching, or mentoring, Eisenstein always keeps kids’ interests close to her heart. “I love being around kids, helping them, teaching them, watching them grow.” She says this passion is the basis for all three of her professions.

Writing Hiding Carly, she says, is by far the most rigorous of those three. “I’m working more than I think I ever worked as a psychologist, talking to people and selling books,” she says. “It’s been wonderful.”

Following her agreement with the FBI, Sean Gray, Junior Special Agent is certainly going to keep Eisenstein busy for years to come.