Making a mint online

His online editor at WebNovel, a Singaporean known as JJ, tells China Daily: "My Vampire System was one of a kind during publication as there was no other novel that offered the same premise and storyline during its serialization. It was a mixture of sci-fi and fantasy themes that the author managed to blend together, where you have people with fantastical superpowers fighting against alien invaders in a futuristic setting."

In the 5-million-word novel, the "system" and "leveling up" elements used in Chinese online literature work in harmony with vampire legends and interstellar sci-fi settings.

Instead of pushing his limits every day by rising at 4 am to write, Sherwin says he is now relaxed, though he still writes 4,000 words a day between 9 am and 5 pm, gym time included.

With five titles under his belt, he is awaiting the publication of his Vampire book in comic form in Chinese, English and Japanese, and would like to explore more of China with his wife, as well as cater to his growing German fan groups, he says.

Sherwin is among the 449,000 overseas online writers on WebNovel who have written 680,000 titles, says Li Hong from the audio-video and digital publishing association, referring to the report on 2024 Chinese online literature overseas trends, which was released during the Third Shanghai International Online Literature Week from Dec 16 to 19.

Li says overseas writers born after the year 2000 account for 45 percent of those writers, and in 2023, 411 titles were viewed more than 10 million times. The hot labels are action, adventure, romance, rebirth and system.

Unlike Sherwin, whose father brought him up on Asian, especially Chinese, dramas and books as a child, Lucia Ewoenam Oniong Ekanem, a 36-year-old from Ghana, became interested in translated Chinese online literature in 2019 during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Under the pen name Glorious_Eagle, she writes online romances about strong women with alpha male husbands that provide her with an escape from the bitterness she feels toward living with a stepmother as a child. The mother of two made a name with The President's Pregnant, Ex-Wife, and most recently worked on Two Times Rejected Luna, which concluded in early December.

"As someone whose first language is not English, I conducted extensive research before publishing anything, with the plot being the most crucial aspect," she says, recalling her first experience of writing on WebNovel as a learning journey in which everything felt new, including the readers' responses.

"To be honest, it has brought about significant changes in my life and for my family," she says.

Ekanem knows the daily update routine well, much like her Chinese peers. "Never miss updates and be prepared," she says. "This may seem difficult, but I have applied it during tough times in my life while battling illness and domestic challenges."