7 Questions For: Author Louis Sachar

Newbery Award–winning author Louis Sachar is the creator of the entertaining Marvin Redpost books as well as the much-loved There’s a Boy in the Girls’ Bathroom, winner of 17 child-voted state awards.

Louis Sachar’s book Holes, winner of the 1999 Newbery Medal, the National Book Award, and the Boston Globe–Horn Book Award, is also an ALA Best Book for Young Adults, an ALA Quick Pick, an ALA Notable Book, and was made into a major motion picture.

After graduating high school, Sachar attended Antioch College for a semester before transferring to University of California, Berkeley, during which time he began helping at an elementary school in return for college credit. Sachar later recalled,

“I thought it over and decided it was a pretty good deal. College credits, no homework, no term papers, no tests, all I had to do was help out in a second/third grade class at Hillside Elementary School. Besides helping out in a classroom, I also became the Noontime Supervisor, or 'Louis the Yard Teacher' as I was known to the kids. It became my favorite college class, and a life changing experience.”

Sachar graduated from UC Berkeley in 1976 with a degree in Economics, and began working on Sideways Stories From Wayside School, a children's book set at an elementary school with supernatural elements. Although the book's students were named after children from Hillside and there is a presumably autobiographical character named "Louis the Yard Teacher," Sachar has said that he draws very little from personal experience, explaining that "....my personal experiences are kind of boring. I have to make up what I put in my books."

Sachar wrote the book at night over the course of nine months, during which he worked during the day in a Connecticut sweater warehouse. After being fired from the warehouse, Sachar decided to go to law school, around which time Sideways Stories From Wayside School was accepted for publication. The book was released in 1978; though it was not widely distributed and subsequently did not sell very well, Sachar began to accumulate a fan base among young readers.[6] Sachar graduated from University of California, Hastings College of the Law in 1980 and did part-time legal work while continuing to write children's books. By 1989, his books were selling well enough that Sachar was able to begin writing full-time.

Sachar married Carla Askew, an elementary school counselor, in 1985. They live in Austin, Texas, and have a daughter, Sherre, born January 19, 1987. Sachar has mentioned both his wife and daughter in his books; Carla was the inspiration for the counselor in There's a Boy in the Girls' Bathroom (1988), and Stanley's lawyer in Holes.

When asked about whether he thought children have changed over the years, Sachar responded: "I've actually been writing since 1976, and my first book is still in print and doing very well. ... I don't think kids have changed."

Click here to read my review of Fuzzy Mud

Click here to read my review of Holes.

And now Louis Sachar faces the 7 Questions:


Question Seven: What are your top three favorite books?

The Unconsoled -- Kazuo Ishaguro
East of Eden  -- John Steinbeck
Clockers  -- Richard Price.

If I answered this at a different time or day, I probably would have chosen three others.

Question Six: How much time do you spend each week writing? Reading?

Maybe ten hours writing. Some weeks very little reading. Others, quite a bit.

Question Five: What was the path that led you to publication?

During my last year of college, for an easy 3 units, I signed up to be a teacher's aide at a nearby elementary school.  It turned out to be my favorite class.  I loved being with the kids.  When I graduated, I decided to try writing a book about the kids I knew there.  That became Sideways Stories From Wayside School.

I mailed the manuscript to ten different publishers. One accepted it.

Question Four: Do you believe writers are born, taught or both? Which was true for you?

I think writers mostly teach themselves. It takes a lot of perseverance and a love of literature. I suppose writers are born with certain qualities that, if exposed to good writing, would choose to pursue it for themselves.


Question Three: What is your favorite thing about writing? What is your least favorite thing?

The freedom to let a story take me places I never expected; the way characters become real to me.

Least favorite thing?  The isolation. I have worked on plays and a movie, and I enjoyed the collaboration with other talented people. I don't have that when writing novels.  Yes, I enjoy working with an editor but it's not the same thing.

Question Two: What one bit of wisdom would you impart to an aspiring writer? (feel free to include as many other bits of wisdom as you like)

Don't expect too much from yourself. The first draft is always awful. The fun part is after the first draft is written, when you begin the process of turning it into something. My second drafts are also awful.  It's not until I get to the third or fourth draft of a book that I start to think it might be good.

Question One: If you could have lunch with any writer, living or dead, who would it be? Why?

Kazuo Ishaguro.  He's always been one of my favorite writers, and I am thrilled that he just won the Nobel Prize.

louissachar.com

Book of the Week: HOLES by Louis Sachar

Classic books become classic books for a reason and we writers need to pay attention to them if we’re to have any hope of creating our own future classics. That’s why I also just reread The Indian in the Cupbard and Tales of the Fourth Grade Nothing (I'll post reviews eventually), and this week I want to talk about Holes.

I once attended a class taught by the wonderful middle grade writer Alan Garinger (click here to read his 7 Question interview), during which he contended Holes was the greatest book for children ever written. Forget Harry Potter, forget Charlotte’s Web, Alan has eyes only for Holes. His own copy was beat up and marked by multiple notes and he claimed that in order to write a successful middle grade novel, future writers had to first read Holes.

Holes was published in 1998, just missing my childhood, and I never got around to reading it nor have I seen the movie. I was skeptical that the book would be such of a much. The title did not impress me nor did I find the concept of boys digging holes in the desert to be particularly enticing. The world needs ditch diggers, it’s true, but why would you want to read a book about them? 

Well, Esteemed Reader, I’m here to tell you that Alan was right. It turns out that a book about digging holes really can be one of the most exciting stories you’ll ever read. I don’t know that it’s better than Harry Potter or Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. How can one possibly qualify such a claim and does it really matter? Holes is as good as those books and I say read them all and be grateful there are so many wonderful books in the world. Who cares which is the best?

For those of you who haven’t read the book, Stanley Yelnats is a boy found guilty of a crime he didn’t commit and sent to a correctional program ironically named Camp Green Lake. The plot of Holes reminded me quite a bit of Stephen King’s The Shawshank Redemption. As in that story, there is an evil Warden who torments our hero and forces him to do work against his will for her ill-gotten gain. Stanley even teaches another boy to read ala Andy Dufresne. Rather than tax evasion and book cooking, our eleven-year-old hero is forced to dig holes in the desert. Why is Stanley digging those holes? Well, if I tell you that, it will spoil the novel for you, and Holes is either a book you've read or you need to drop everything and read it right now.

It’s to be a short review this week. Louis Sachar doesn’t need me to promote his work and anyone who knows how I can convince him to answer the 7 Questions is my new best friend. Once I've said a book is as good as Harry Potter, there’s not much point in my heaping more praise or hyperbole upon it.

So I’ll finish up with a thought for writers about another professor I had for another writing class. He was a bitter man who published a small literary novel fifteen years ago and has spent the time since picking at an unfinished manuscript. He actually cried in front of the class the night his agent dropped him.

This man, who shall remain nameless and would never believe I was talking about him anyway (I bumped into him earlier this year and he didn't remember my name), taught very little in the way of practical advice. Mostly, he lectured about how his own writing was better than every other writer out there and I personally witnessed him explaining this to Michael Chabon. He showed movie clips and read only the first pages of our short stories, but his was probably one of the most useful writing classes I've ever been in because this man showed us by example the sort of writer not to be.

The reason I bring this jerk up is because one night in class he said, “I may not be able to write an entire suspense novel better than Tom Clancy, but I can write a better sentence than him.” This is a line that made me laugh then and I've chuckled thinking about it ever since.

Gee, if only people bought and read sentences rather than books, he would outsell Tom Clancy! As that is not the case, he better write some more sentences, say about a book’s worth, and earn the right to brag to Michael Chabon.

Lois Sachar writes a good sentence. He also creates memorable characters I’m still thinking about. He also puts those characters in extreme danger and has them fight to the breaking point to achieve their goals, keeping the reader in constant suspense. He also interweaves important themes about race and class seamlessly through the main narrative, enhancing the work without ever becoming preachy. In fact, I couldn't find one thing in Holes to gripe about. It’s perfect.

My own copy is now beat up and covered in highlights and notes. Alan Garinger says every middle grade writer should read Holes and I agree. But more, I’m never going to listen to another pompous buffoon tell me it is a virtue to specialize in one element of writing. It all needs to be perfect, or as close as I can get it. And it can be done. Holes is proof.

STANDARD DISCLAIMER: Book of the Week is simply the best book I happened to read in a given week. There are likely other books as good or better that I just didn’t happen to read that week. Also, all reviews here will be written to highlight a book’s positive qualities. It is my policy that if I don’t have something nice to say online, I won’t say anything at all (usually). I’ll leave you to discover the negative qualities of each week’s book on your own.