Very few people can say that they wrote a book less than a year removed from graduating from college that was later published and became an international bestseller. Louis Sachar is one of the few that can claim that with Sideways Stories from Wayside School.
Sachar wrote Sideways Stories from Wayside School thinking that he would write only one children's book and be done. However, because of the profound success of Sideways Stories from Wayside School, which he wrote for fun, his entire life was changed and he became a children's book author.
In writing Sideways Stories from Wayside School, Louis Sachar drew upon a few of his experiences working in an elementary school, where he worked during college. At that elementary school, he was called "Louis the Yard Teacher," which became the basis for one of the characters in the Wayside School series. Beyond names of characters and inspirations for situations, Sachar says that he does not draw much from personal experience when writing his books, writing that "[his] personal experiences are kind of boring. I have to make up what I put in my books."
