American · b. 1954
Louis Sachar is an American author of children's and young adult fiction. Born in East Meadow, New York, he grew up in California and studied economics at the University of California, Berkeley. He later earned a law degree from Hastings College of the Law and worked part-time as a lawyer while writing. He began with Sideways Stories from Wayside School in 1978, a collection of short, absurd tales about a thirty-story school. He followed it with more Wayside books and novels such as There's a Boy in the Girls' Bathroom. His best-known book, Holes, appeared in 1998 and won the Newbery Medal and the National Book Award for Young People's Literature. Sachar wrote the screenplay for the 2003 film adaptation and published two further books about Camp Green Lake, Small Steps and The Cardturner. His books use short chapters, plain language and dry humor, and they treat young readers as capable of following complicated plots. They are widely read in American schools.