Can top light novelists in Taiwan live well on royalties? Not necessarily. Chatting with a top author who writes fiction full-time, Utsudo learned that during the heyday of Chinese-language publishing, they still received royalties after a first printing sold out, but in recent years have long received only the guaranteed advance. If even big-name authors can’t sell past a first printing, newcomers and ordinary authors fare even worse. Even Taiwan’s top light novelists live at best like salaried workers and are often weighed down by anxiety.

Translated from Utsudo’s original Chinese column.

A chat with a big-name author

This was a conversation with a certain big-name author.

We were chatting at a café, having a good time, when we somehow drifted into talking about the state of the writing world, and then it was all sighs again. Yes—dropping sales, fewer readers, and which author has taken on a side job.

Like me, they’re a “professional author,” but they truly make a living purely from writing fiction, and their income genuinely covers their living expenses. I call myself a “professional author” too, but besides fiction, the jobs I take are also writing articles or scripts, so I use the term broadly.

Main job and side job

Back to the topic. That day we started discussing various authors’ “main jobs” and “side jobs.”

I asked, “Have you ever thought about a side job?”

They nodded. “Yes! But I don’t know what to do.”

“Do you have any particular interests or hobbies?” I asked.

There was a silence for a while.

“Oh, I do!” They pulled out their phone. “Does playing mobile games count?”

“Um, no,” I said, speechless. But the men on their phone screen looked pretty tasty, so I immediately pulled out my phone. “But I’m interested in that game of yours.”

—And so we exchanged info on the legendary women-oriented adult games.

Royalties and guaranteed advances

Ahem, back to the topic. We then discussed current fiction sales.

They said that in the early days, during the heyday of Chinese-language publishing, they still received royalties after a book sold out its first printing. But in recent years, they haven’t received any royalties beyond the basic fee for a long time.

Briefly: how novelists are paid depends on the contract. With a buyout, you receive a single one-time fee. Another type has a basic fee (usually first-print copies × price × percentage), and if sales exceed the first printing or a certain amount, you receive what’s called “royalties.”

Royalties are calculated in various ways. The one that stuck with me is where the percentage rises as you sell more—the more books you sell, the more you earn. For example, 7% for 1,000–3,000 copies, 9% for 3,000–5,000, and so on.

But if even big-name authors can’t sell past a first printing, newcomers and ordinary authors fare even worse. They probably only get a guaranteed fee, likely around NT$20,000–40,000.

The pressure of reading sales reports

They said seeing the numbers on sales reports puts a lot of pressure on them.

Personally, I never look at the reports. Besides stress, I can’t think of any benefit, so out of sight, out of mind… ahem. It’s probably a kind of escapism, but at least I don’t have to bear that pressure, which is a good thing, right?

The real lives of top authors

After chatting for a while, I realized that even Taiwan’s top light novelists live, at best, about like salaried workers, sometimes even needing help from family. That made me understand even more how incredibly hard it is to make a living writing novels.

They’re often plagued by anxiety too. In an era of declining sales, figuring out how to survive really is a challenge.

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Further reading

• Previous: Hey! I Heard You’re a Writer on Ghost Island #198: The July 9 Penana Interview
• Start from the beginning: Hey! I Heard You’re a Writer on Ghost Island #01: Utsudo’s Debut — A Road to the Dream Covered in Frost
• Utsudo’s books

About the author

Utsudo is a Taiwanese light novelist and novelist VTuber with more than ten years in the industry and 40 commercially published print books. Her novel 《遺失的情書》 received a 2022 Ministry of Culture youth creative award. The 《嘿！聽說妳在鬼島當作家》 series records her experiences as a novelist in Taiwan.