Latest / Book Flood Podcast / Encore Summer 2026: Ernesto Cisneros (E69)
Transcript
- Thomas Nixon: Welcome to the Book Flood podcast. I am your host, Tom Nixon. My guest this week is Ernesto Cisneros. Ernesto is the nationally acclaimed author of Efrén Divided. Ernesto was born and raised in Santa Ana, California, where he still teaches. As an author, Ernesto believes in providing today's youth with an honest depiction of characters with whom they can identify. Additionally, he strives to build empathy and belonging in our community. Welcome, Ernesto. Ernesto Cisneros: ⁓ well, thank you so much for the invitation. It's a it's an honor to be here. Thomas Nixon: Well, thank you very much for coming. I am definitely a fan of Efrén Divided. I like to tell folks that I discovered it. I didn't, but I like to tell folks that I did. It is truly a memorable book. Let's talk a little bit about your background. What is your career path? How did you get here? Ernesto Cisneros: So I've been teaching for 29 years now and I teach language arts and ever since I started teaching middle grade in 2000, my students always told me they liked my stories and my career began when one of my former students told me, you know, you really should try and publish your stories. And it was then that I decided, you know what, I'm going to give this a shot. I didn't know anything about the publishing world. I decided to just learn as much as I could. and kind of take my students on a journey with me. And it took about 15 years before I was able to publish anything. And to be quite honest, when I first started writing, my intention was never really to get published because I didn't think it was something that was doable. So what I wanted was just to learn as much as I could, give that information to my students. And the plan was actually that one of my students was going to get published someday. And they were going to published a book and then the acknowledgments, it was going to say thank you to Ernesto Cisneros, my language arts teacher, for teaching me everything I needed to make this possible. And that's the way I envisioned myself being published. It was going to be on that one page, the acknowledgments. And then 2016 came around and some horrible things were being said about the Latino community. A lot of my kids, my students were living in fear. not much different than where it's actually happening right now. It's almost like a deja vu for me. And I had one particular student asked if he could speak with me after school. And he came over and he told me that his dad had been deported, taken away on the weekend prior. And this is a fantastic student. he was amazing because even though something so tragic had just happened, he He was still doing his homework. was doing so, you know, going on continuing with his life. And it was just, ⁓ I just felt like I wanted to give him some, some advice as a teacher. We kind of, you know, you kind of, these almost become like your children and you want to take care of them as well. And I didn't feel that I was able to give him the advice that I wanted. ⁓ so for me, Effron divided was almost like a redo. So I wanted to offer him something that would help them. during this really difficult time in his life. And so that's kind of how Effort & Divide was born. I started writing about my community. In fact, it's kind of strange that when I did finish the book, by the way, I wrote that book in six months, which never happens. It was one of those moments where it just kind of wrote itself. But I wrote about the community, I wrote about my students, I wrote about my childhood, I kind of meshed everything together. Thomas Nixon: right? Ernesto Cisneros: And this was supposed to be a practice book for me. Again, I never thought, especially after 15 years of not being able to publish anything. I remember actually contacting my agent and saying, and apologizing to her. And I remember telling her, ⁓ I know that I was supposed to go work on something else. I'm thinking you might be able to have better luck selling. And instead I wrote a book about an immigrant family, ⁓ in 2016. ⁓ so the timing was, was completely off. At least I thought it was, ⁓ I never thought anybody would, would buy this book when they weren't buying anything else I had written before. And, ⁓ It was just a gift because two weeks later after we submitted it, we received a notice from the vice president of Harper Collins. And that was just amazing. I'm like, ⁓ my goodness, the vice president, how does that happen? Especially after so long. And I remember her saying that she didn't just want to publish the book, she needed to publish the book. And yeah, I never expected that to happen. I just didn't think there was a place for a book like that. And I wrote that one just for my, my vision was I was going to make copies of it for my students and we were going to read it in the classroom and that was going to be it. So it's kind of like an accidental career in a way. Thomas Nixon: And, you know, I always like to point this well, in this case, I want to talk about two things. One is I always like to point out to all the authors or potential authors out there. You're an overnight success after 15 years, you know, these things, that's a common story. You know, if two things with writers, if you think you're going to become a millionaire, well, but they all think that that everybody who writes a And often it takes a long time. And the other thing, seems, unfortunately, like we're circling back around on 2016. And it seems like this is certainly a book where the themes are relevant again. Ernesto Cisneros: You Sadly, that does seem to be the case again. Thomas Nixon: So, Efren divided one, the prestigious Pura Belpré Medal and all sorts of other things. When you were writing, did you have any sense that it would be so well received? Ernesto Cisneros: I knew it was going to be received well by my students because one, a few of them were in the book. It actually took place right there in my neighborhood where I grew up. But no, no, I had no idea that something like that was going to, could even happen. In fact, when right before the, was it the night before? The night before the awards night, before they announced all the winners, I remember receiving an email and it's from my editor and Rosemary and she sends me an email saying we need to talk and she sets up a zoom and and so I'm a little worried because I was late with my next book and I thought okay I'm gonna get I'm gonna get in trouble here and I turned the next morning I opened up the computer and I go on to the little zoom meeting and I see maybe a dozen faces on the screen. And at that point I'm just thinking, ⁓ my God, this is horrible. They're having an intervention for me with all the editors. I'm really, really in trouble. And then one of the gentlemen introduces himself and he was the head of the committee, Pura Belpré Committee And he lets me know that I had just one. I was one, relieved that I wasn't in trouble. And two, was just, it blew me away. My students always ask me, like, what's one of your dreams? And I always said, I want a little shiny little medal. I had never won an award ever in my life. didn't do participation awards when I was a kid. So I never received a ribbon, a trophy, a plaque. I had none of those things. So that was my very first medal ever in my life. So yeah, it blew my mind. It was just amazing. Thomas Nixon: How wonderful. What did your students think of it? Ernesto Cisneros: ⁓ they were super happy. And it's funny, the way that my students treat me has been, it's really difficult, not difficult, it's very different now, very wonderful too. So now sometimes in the classroom, I'll walk around the room and I'll see them and they're Googling me and they're like, ⁓ look, here's you in this place. Here's you traveling over here. And they always ask me if I'm famous. First day of school, it was really strange because I opened the door and I'm gonna welcome the students in for the first time and. Probably six, seven, eight of them had my book in their hand and they wanted me to sign their book. And then they applauded and they were all excited because they got to be with a famous teacher. It's really special. It's really funny because I used to separate my teacher life and my author life and now they've kind of meshed into one. Thomas Nixon: Hard to avoid at this point. In the 90s, I'm a former teacher as well, and in the 90s I wrote several books, but non-fiction reference if you can imagine that. And so it doesn't just have that same pizzazz because it was non-fiction reference, but I can imagine that the students would be just so excited to be one of your students. Ernesto Cisneros: Yes, yes. I wanted, at one point in my life, I wanted to be published because I remember when I was in college, I would see my professors and I'd go to office hours with them and they had their books behind them. And I just thought that was the coolest thing ever. And I was just thinking, okay, you know what? Someday I would love, love to just be able to publish a book, even if it doesn't sell, even if I sell, you know, 15 copies, that's fine. I just wanted it behind me. So when I tell students, but okay, here's what I think you should do with your writing. Thomas Nixon: Mm. Ernesto Cisneros: they would kind of see my book and be like, okay, we're going to listen to him. And yeah. Thomas Nixon: What is your writing process like? Ernesto Cisneros: Oh my goodness. A hot mess. It's actually very different with every book. With "Efrén Divided" I was picking up my oldest son at school and he was doing wrestling and so I had to pick him up at 6 p.m. So from 2.30 to 6 p.m. I sat at my desk every single Monday to Friday and I just wrote. Six months later, the book was born. "Falling Short" had happened after the pandemic and I had spent so much time on the computer that I remember I was teaching on the computer through Zoom. If I needed to interact with family members through Zoom, any connection and then, right, and then my other job is writing is on the computer as well. So after a while, I really didn't wanna be on the computer anymore. so It was a little bit more difficult. In fact the second book falling short I wrote it because I was so Scared that my book was gonna fall short of the first one and that's why I love that title and Then this next one has been a journey Effort was very emotional. It's very sad. It was a sad book Falling short was a very happy book. It was very It was A lot of students told me I made them laugh a lot and I kind of felt like, okay, I made people cry with the first one, I'm gonna make them laugh with the second. Now I'm being told that my next book is actually my funniest and my saddest book at the same time. So that's kind of interesting to hear. But the process honestly just kind of changes. With Deferrin, I was very hard on myself. I was into the Mamba mentality, the Kobe Bryant mentality. Thomas Nixon: Boom. Ernesto Cisneros: So I would wake up at 5 a.m. and I would just think to myself, okay, Kobe Bryant is playing, practicing already somewhere on a court. And he knows that when the game is on the line, he deserves to take the final shot because he's worked harder than anybody else. He's put himself in that spot. So I would just ask myself, okay, would you like to fulfill your dream of becoming a published author or would you rather go back to bed? And so I would get up in the morning. I would work during nutrition, lunch, after school, 6 p.m. Sometimes if I got, had a little bit of energy left, I'd stay up late and work too. I got very sick after that book. It's not healthy to get up early and go to bed late. And yes, it was horrible. And now my philosophy has changed. Now I feel like if I go for a walk, that's part of the writing process. If I go to the gym, driving around, watching anime, all these things influence my writing. And now it's about refreshing my mind so that my mind is fresh when I write. And if the book takes a year to write or it takes two years or it takes three, it's a whole different experience now. So I'm no longer as stressed. I'm a happier author. Even my students, I think they notice the difference. Where I can focus, my first job is always going to be teaching. And so writing is kind of like my side job. And I want to make sure that I'm able to fulfill my responsibilities as a teacher first. And so, you know, it's changed. I'm a lot more forgiving of myself now. Thomas Nixon: Which is good. Do you have a title for this coming third book that you can share? Ernesto Cisneros: Yes. Mm-hmm. Yes, yes. I'm very excited. I can't wait for the world to see it. It's called Gessel, Just in Time, and it's a time travel book. It's about a 12-year-old boy, and he, who unfortunately loses his father, and when a burglar breaks into the house, and he shoots the dad, and the boy has lost his smile. And his name is Quetzalcoatl, and named after one of my students I had a long time ago. I had trouble to... Thomas Nixon: Really? Ernesto Cisneros: pronouncing his name and I was thinking I need a name I need a really really cool name and I used to call him Gessel for short and that's where the name of the character came from and essentially it's a story about the boy who's kind of lost his smile and he decides I'm sorry he makes a wish he just kind of one day decides you know says I wish I could see my dad one more time and the next day he wakes up and it's 1985 and he gets to see his dad strangely enough though He sees them when he's the same age. So they're both 12 years old and they get to, he gets to meet them and they kind of become like best friends. And at first he just wants to hang out and get to know his father. And as the story progresses, he starts thinking, I wonder if there's something I could do where I might be able to, you know, save him. And so the book just takes a little bit more of dramatic turn towards the end, but I'm really, really pleased with how it's coming out. And again, I can't wait and it should be coming out early 2026. Thomas Nixon: Kind of a science fiction twist to that. Ernesto Cisneros: Yes, yes, there's a little bit of magic, but most of it, I still consider it to be realistic fiction. Thomas Nixon: Mm-hmm. How has being a teacher affected your writing? You've talked about that a little bit. Ernesto Cisneros: It's kind of like a catch-22. So people ask me sometimes, like, but would you be able to write books faster if you left teaching? But my answer is always, well, if I left teaching, what would I write about? So I kind of need the teaching to fuel my writing. But the same token, sometimes it's really hard to write when you come home and you have report cards or sometimes the kids are going through things and... Thomas Nixon: Perhaps you can go in depth. Ernesto Cisneros: Like I said, it becomes part of your problems as well. Right now we have a lot of really frightened kiddos at my school, just with everything going on with the politics. And they're just fearful. so right now I try and do as much as I can to help support them. But again, that does take a toll on me emotionally. So when you come home, you know, and you find out things about their lives that they're dealing with, and it's just, it's a lot. And so maybe Thomas Nixon: Mm-hmm. Ernesto Cisneros: If I weren't teaching, maybe writing would be easier, but again, what would I write about? mean, they're the ones that kind of fuel me. They're my gauge. They're my editors. When we do creative writing, I do offer them like pages, chapters. I have about four kids right now who have a copy of my manuscript and they're tearing it apart. Everything I teach them, now they're using to edit my, and help me revise my work. So it's a wonderful experience. Honestly, I wouldn't change it. It's perfect just the way it is. Thomas Nixon: Yeah. That is very cool. know, it's a little bit now you can put them on your acknowledgments page because they've been helping you write the book. Ernesto Cisneros: Hahaha Yes, for sure for sure Thomas Nixon: Talked with a lot of writers who have been very clear how book banning or potential book banning has come for their books. Have you had any of that with Efren or others? Ernesto Cisneros: Strangely, I'm not really sure why. When I wrote Efren, one thing I wanted to do was I wanted to offer... So my sense is that it's really, it's a lot easier to dislike people you don't know. And when you get to know them, you tend to find something that, you you have common ground. And with Efren, I wanted to invite all of America, all the people who were hating on the Latino community to basically come to my house and meet my family. so that they could judge for themselves, you know, that we're not criminals, we're not all the horrible things that they were saying about us. And, one second. And so I tried not to be political. just wanted to say, here's a window, a front door. In my case with Efren, I kind of opened the garage door so they could see everything, just come into the house and see for what it really is and then make up your own minds. So for whatever reason, Efren Devite has pretty much escaped bans. I don't know why I have so many of actually, almost all Latino friends I have have been banned. soft band that it did receive was when Scholastic offered an alternative collection of someone librarians order the books they could get the regular stack of books a selection or they can get one that was purposely it took away all the stories that had LGBT characters all the people of color it was kind of like a censored version for the book fairs and that really broke my heart because once I did become published My dream was to be able to take my students to the library and to be able to see the Scholastic Book Fair. And I was just thinking how awesome is it going to be when I take them to the library to go see the books and my book is right there on the shelf for them to see. And so when that happened, I was devastated that Scholastic did something like that because again, that was one of the dreams that I had. Thomas Nixon: Yeah, so I'm a former school librarian. I manage library services for Fresno Unified. And you, your librarian can request those books, though. Some do, some don't. Yeah, I thought that that was a miss from Scholastic who does so many things so well. But I understand it. I live in California. I'm not in Georgia. I'm not in Florida. I'm not in Texas. so folks working there in libraries, that's a very different kind of area. Ernesto Cisneros: And to that. Yes, and it was just sad because a lot of the students, like when I grew up, I wasn't seeing books that reflected characters like myself. To Scholastic's credit, they did issue an apology and they promised to do better. yes, so we're very grateful for that. Thomas Nixon: Mm-hmm, they did. So what's next? Do you have a book four in mind yet? Ernesto Cisneros: Well, right now it's the guess I want. We're still working on the edits. I'm very grateful for I have a new editor right now, Courtney, and she's phenomenal. And she's putting me through the wringer right now, which I appreciate. As you get more experienced, your skin gets thicker. And so now I welcome all the criticism that yet because it only makes the work better. So I'm super excited to we're almost done. We're at the finish line. Yes, it's. Thomas Nixon: ⁓ nice. Ernesto Cisneros: Yeah, it's really nice. And the one thing that I really appreciate about the whole process is that, again, I take it back to the classroom. And so my students are always asking me about, like, so what are you doing now? And I'm like, ⁓ so let me show you. These are my, and I'll show them the stack of papers. These are the edits. This is my 15 page editorials that I have for my editor. And I like them seeing the process because I have a couple of them. I have one student who right now is working on a book. And this is a student who Thomas Nixon: Mm-hmm. Ernesto Cisneros: was failing in my class, wasn't doing much work. And I guess he just thought, he just figured if Mr. can write a book, so can I, which is awesome. And so yeah, that's been a blessing. So I do, I always share whatever my process is with the students. Right now we're creating, we're gonna be beginning our unit for writing. And so they have to come up with their own story ideas. and I'm also doing the same thing. So we're actually starting from scratch together. then throughout the year, we're going to see where the adventure takes us. Thomas Nixon: Nice. Did I miss one of your books? You have Ifrin divided, Faultling short. Ernesto Cisneros: Polly Short and then Efren Dividido, The Translation. That one took a while. I am a big believer that translations are actually more difficult to come by than writing a whole book. It's really difficult to translate, especially with Spanish is very diverse. In Mexico City, you're going to hear somebody speaking it different from Texas, from South LA. It's going to be a little bit different everywhere. So yeah, it was a challenge. Thomas Nixon: ⁓ right. Mm-hmm. And Spanish is very idiomatic. so trying to take an English idiom and put it into Spanish, that takes a special talent for sure. Ernesto Cisneros: Mm-hmm. Yeah, it was a real challenge, but I'm so thrilled with effort divided we in my district. We were doing a book club one time we were able to give English copies of effort divided to the kiddos We gave Spanish versions of effort and the video to the parents and this was supposed to just be a book club and What ended up happening is the next meeting we had? We discovered that the parents had never really shared their own personal stories with their kiddos with their children Thomas Nixon: Hmm. Ernesto Cisneros: And so that became the topic of interest for them. And they started talking about that. And we started to, forgot all about my book and we were talking about, so what did you guys talk about? And they would tell us about their adventures. And so what my school district decided to do with the help of their face team was that we published an anthology of their short stories. So now the parents are published authors as well. And that all came about from Efferent Divided. So it's, it's, it's been a godsend. It really, really has. So many good things have happened. Thomas Nixon: Do you get to do mini presentations? Do you go to other schools? Do you go to libraries? Ernesto Cisneros: So when Effort Divided came out, I always tell people that when I first came out, I think I saw like five copies. Mostly my mom and my dad, think. It was during the pandemic and. Sorry. So everything was on Zoom. I did, ⁓ my goodness, how many days in a year? There's about 360. I did about 200, closer to 70 visits that year, all virtual. So that was the nice thing because everybody was kind of struggling for content. And so I got, it was kind of word of mouth. I would visit a teacher virtually and then they would tell another teacher and then somebody else. And before I knew it, I was just like going door to door kind of the book. No, I... Thomas Nixon: You were hustling. Ernesto Cisneros: Yeah, but to answer your question, I don't get to do too many visits just because I'm a school teacher and they happen during the day. But there are times when I'll do them before school and that works beautifully with the schools from the East Coast because the three hour difference. So I sometimes I think I have another one coming up in two weeks and I'm gonna have to get up like at 430 in the morning and go to work just because of the hour difference. Thomas Nixon: Right? Ernesto Cisneros: And sometimes I'll do it during my prep period or during lunch. And sometimes if I'm able to, sometimes I'll squeeze a quick one after school. So most of my visits are through Zoom. And I do wish I could travel a little bit more. Unfortunately, it's just it's not doable because the only time I have off is during the summers. And that's when the school's out. So. Thomas Nixon: when students mostly are off as well. Is there a book or a series of books from your childhood that still resonates with you? Ernesto Cisneros: I wish I could tell you that there was and there kind of is. I would say Encyclopedia Brown was the book for me. And the reason for that was that my sixth grade teacher and seventh grade teacher, Mr. Gleason, he would just read the stories to us. then we would all be really excited to try and be the ones who figured it out and solve the case. And they were short. And I mean, they would just talk about, know, incidents. Thomas Nixon: ⁓ yeah. with me. Ernesto Cisneros: Gratification because you know you only had to read a three four pages to get the whole story and then you got to see if you solved the mystery or not So I'd love that that series but as far as other books I Wish I had a better answer for you, but this is the the real answer is I Didn't really connect with books. I remember my teacher giving me The lion the witch in the wardrobe when I was in sixth grade and I remember reading it and I really enjoyed it I did However, when I got home, I just remember thinking, well, I don't have a magic wardrobe at my house. And when you look at a lot of the stories that took place, a lot of the kids there were destined for greatness. They were supposed to inherit this or they were from, you know, their family came from royalty and they were gonna have some powers or something like that. And I came from a family of service people. So everybody in my family, they fix cars, they clean hotels, they work in factories. And so when I would pick up a book, like The Line, The Witch, and The Wardrobe, I'm thinking, okay, so that boy gets to be king someday. And I get to fix people's cars, I get to people's grass. Somehow that didn't seem fair to me. And so, no, no, it just didn't. And so I put the books down because I just didn't like that message. Thomas Nixon: Doesn't correlate much, does it? No. Mm-hmm. Ernesto Cisneros: Yeah, so I wish that there were books. Gary Soto, Sandra Cisneros didn't come until the late 80s. And then Pam Munoz was the third person that came around. By the time I was trying to become a published author, Meg Medina came around, Matt de la Peña. Matt de la Peña, shout out to Matt. Hey, Matt, thank you. He says he never did anything, but he did because I remember going to the bookstore and seeing Mexican white boy. I was, and I, I honestly, picked up the book. I did not open it. I just grabbed it and I went straight to pay for the book because I figured, ⁓ my God, somebody just wrote a book about me. I have to read this. And it really did change my, the way that I saw literature. And I just thought, okay, you know what? I'm going to write the books that I would have loved to have had when I was. kid. Thomas Nixon: So two things, one, Gary Soto, Fresno boy, grew up here. So it's neat to read some of his books because you go, wait a minute, I know where that place is. And the other thing, Matt De La Pena was on the podcast. I met him at a local children's bookstore and we had a conversation and he was nice enough to come on. yeah, he's one of those people that have really... Ernesto Cisneros: Mm-hmm. Thomas Nixon: changed he and Meg Medina and people like that. Pam Munoz Ryan have really changed what books look like. What are you reading now? Ernesto Cisneros: So I am actually reading away By Megan E Freeman and it's a companion to her first book alone, which is fantastic and they won ⁓ my gosh, just the resume. I mean the amount of awards at that book received So I'm super excited. I just started the first chapter So far, it's amazing as I knew was going to be and then the other book that I'm reading is I reread the first book is by Tori Maldonado hands is the book and now I'm reading the Spanish one. Yes and my goodness both authors I'm just huge a huge fan of both of them you know books and verse are fantastic especially for reluctant readers and so is this one quick chapters and I'm it's I'm actually really studying this because he purposely creates the book for he kind of caters to his audience and he wants them to be able to read through some of the chapters are like one page, which is amazing. I have ADD and my attention isn't always, you know, it's not always there. I'm not able to hyper focus on demand and I really appreciate his style of writing. I love books and verse as well because the flow is there and it's just the pacing and it's just a wonderful, I don't know. I just, I can get through them so quickly. So there's a immediate reward afterwards too. So those are the two books that I'm reading. I always want to make sure that I'm reading books that I. I want to be thinking to myself, like, how did they do this? And I want to go back and first I read them for enjoyment and then I go back and kind of deconstruct them and be like, okay, how's he getting me to feel these emotions? And then I kind of study them. so there, I'm really, so far I'm really happy with both books. Thomas Nixon: That's interesting. I want to thank you, Ernesto, for coming on the podcast today. To our viewers and listeners, please like, subscribe, and share wherever you are listening to this or watching this. Again, Ernesto, thank you so much. Great to have you here. Ernesto Cisneros: Well, thanks. I had a wonderful time speaking to you. Hopefully someday we'll meet in person, maybe at a conference or someplace. So make sure you say hi if you go to a conference and thanks again. I'm a huge fan of yours. I listened to your interviews and you've had some big names. So when I received your invitation, I was just kind of floored like, ⁓ my goodness, you he said Jerry Kraft and Beth LaPena and these are some big names. So I'm truly honored that you invited me. Thank you. Thomas Nixon: ⁓ absolutely. I have been lucky. I have been very lucky, that's for sure. Thank you.