Louis Sachar is an award winning young-adult mystery-comedy author who’s perhaps best known for humorous writings such as the Wayside School series and Holes.

Winner of the 1998 U.S. National Book Award for Young People’s Literature and the 1999 Newbery Medal, Sachar has published over 20 books in total, with his most recent novel, Fuzzy Mud, hitting the shelves in 2015. He also wrote the screenplay for the 2003 Walt Disney film adaptation of Holes, which made $71.4 million globally.

Books like Holes have become the topic of household discussion, but Louis Sachar himself isn’t too well known as far as many people are concerned. Just how well do you know this unique author?

10 Facts About Louis Sachar

• Louis Sachar was born in East Meadow, New York, on the 20th March 1954.
• As a child in Tustin, California, Sachar used to have orange fights with other local kids!
• Significant authors who have inspired Sachar include J.D. Salinger, Kurt Vonnegut, E.L. Doctorow, Margaret Atwood, E.B White, Richard Price and Kazuo Ishiguro.
• In the aftermath of his father’s death. Sachar had a short, but extremely successful, stint as a door-to-door salesman.
• During his college years, Sachar helped out in classrooms at Hillside Elementary School, and earned the nickname ‘Louis the Yard Teacher’ while serving as the Noontime Supervisor.
• His first book, Sideways Stories From Wayside School, was started in 1976, and took about 9 months to complete. It was written in the evenings to fit around careers in warehousing and law school.
• Sachar practised part-time legal work for 9 years after graduating law school in 1980: it wasn’t until 1989 that sales of his books allowed him to pursue a single-minded writing career!
• Sachar writes every morning of the week, although does so for typically no more than 2 hours a day.
• While working on a book, Louis Sachar never discusses his in-progress writing, not even with family or his editor!
• Sachar is a keen bridge player, frequently entering tournaments.

If you’re a fan of Louis Sachar and his works, it might interest you to know that a production of his most well-known work, Holes, is upcoming at The Grand Theatre, Blackpool. Ideal for adults and children over the age of 8, the production (from The Children’s Theatre Partnership and Royal & Derngate Northampton) runs from 5th May until 9th May, with a total of 8 performances.

You can buy tickets for Holes today, so make sure you don’t miss out!