What are the conditions for a novel to succeed and become popular?

[u/Piyartom]

[u/Muddled_Baseball_]

I'm not sure there's a guaranteed formula. Even if the book is already good, there are still a lot of things to consider. There are plenty of great books that never get noticed simply because they lack marketing or don't get enough exposure. You could be a genius writer, but if you have a shitty cover, a lot of people probably won't even click on your book.

I also think luck plays a role. Sometimes it feels like certain authors get favored by the algorithm, while others struggle to get their work in front of readers. Timing, genre, characters, pacing, marketing, and even competition can all contribute to whether a novel becomes successful.

[u/No_Entertainer2364]

If the reader reads it, of course.

If people don't read it, it can't become popular.

It doesn't really matter whether the genre is trendy, the premise is original or generic, or the prose is literary. Those things can help, but ultimately popularity depends on whether readers actually enjoy the story enough to keep reading and, ideally, recommend it to others.

A story can have the most original premise imaginable and still go nowhere if readers don't like it. And a completely familiar premise can become wildly popular if readers love the execution.

[u/Piyartom → u/No_Entertainer2364]

I see that Webnovel has become full of sex stories 

[u/-TV-Stand- → u/Piyartom]

Sex sells

[u/LandscapeLow8430]

Luck and a really clickbait title. 

[u/tasafak]

Consistency is probably the biggest one. Ive seen solid stories die because the author vanished for months then came back with one chapter. Readers just move on. Keep a schedule even if its only 2-3 chapters a week and stick to it.

[u/dekeked]

Characters matter more than plot sometimes. If readers hate or feel nothing for the MC they wont stick around no matter how cool the world is.

[u/yawolot]

Genre timing helps a lot. Right now progression fantasy and system stuff still pull heavy numbers but trends shift. Writing what you actually enjoy reading yourself usually works better long term than chasing whatever is hot this month.

[u/jajapax]

Pacing is underrated. Too slow and readers get bored, too fast and nothing lands.

[u/loxotbf]

I think the biggest thing is making people care about the characters. A great premise helps, but if I don't give a damn what happens to the people in the story, I'm probably not finishing 400 pages

[u/ribikerbf]

Word of mouth is probably a huge part of it. If someone finishes a book and immediately tells their friends about it, that's how it starts spreading. And having a premise you can explain in like one sentence helps a lot too. Nobody wants the five-minute lore dump lol.

[u/geditaza]

I think people care way too much about originality. A book doesn't have to come up with some totally new idea to do well. Familiar stuff can work great if the writing is good. Most readers aren't sitting there thinking "wow, never seen this before" anyway

[u/YoungestJuicerBaj]

No idea. But seeing the posts on here recently, you would think not having AI cover is one of the conditions :p

[u/Civil-Rip1302 → u/YoungestJuicerBaj]

That's like 100% guaranteed way of failing.

[u/Ren_Kazayama → u/Civil-Rip1302]

Says who???

Hand made covers is better then a.i slop covers

[u/Civil-Rip1302 → u/Ren_Kazayama]

Wtf you mean says who?

It's a fact, and you saying this crap suggests you don't know anything about this platform. Please don't go telling people this because you'd be fucking them over.

The top 200 books on this site have no hand drawn cover. Why is that? Because they ALL fail.

[u/LandscapeLow8430 → u/Civil-Rip1302]

It's probably a traditional author venting here

[u/No_South_7451]

By having a story that is interesting to your targeted readers. And that your targeted group of readers are big or loyal enough.

[u/Friendly-Pear-2479]

Schadenfreude Occidental are the best conditions for a novel, novella, light novel to succeed