Reading is fun. There are many novels written by many authors, and each contains its own little world for the reader to get lost in. However, one problem any avid reader might encounter is running out of books to read. While there are many ways to acquire more books, such as a bookstore or the library, it’s not cheap to shell out three hundred NT every week for a new book.

An alternative I’ve discovered recently is web novels. Sites like Royal Road and WordPress allow authors to write and upload their own stories or fan fiction to a free site where anyone else can read them. While some people think web novels are bad books that haven’t been published yet, their different format leads to a more diverse and accessible experience.

I think every reader should give web novels a try. Here’s why:

Web novels aren’t books

Although some web novels end up being picked up by Amazon or another publisher, most web novels stay on whatever site they were published on. Web novels, unlike books, are published chapter-by-chapter as the author writes them. This means that there is a lot more audience feedback, and authors can alter their stories according to their audience’s comments. This style of writing also means that authors don’t really need to have an end to their stories; in fact, some writers even decide to keep their stories going with escalating plots.

Comments and feedback from other readers can let you pick out details you missed or craft theories in the comments. Comments also provide valuable feedback, such as plotholes and typos, which can greatly help new writers who are still figuring out how to write. Best of all, many sites allow writers to post their stories for free, leading to a large number of free stories by thousands of authors.

Web novels are actually good

The benefits of reading web novels extend past availability and convenience. Because of how easy it is to write a web novel, there are a lot of different people who can share their own stories when they had no chance of reaching an audience before. Because of this, there are stories that have different takes on how characters and plotting should work. Many readers that I’ve met admit that web novels have expanded their perspective in some way.

Curiosity44, A member of a discord group for RoyalRoad wrote: “One thing I learned from reading thousands of stories was how to try to understand the perspective of people around me. Not just my own viewpoint in a given situation, but how others are feeling, thinking, and acting. …we can see how characters can so easily become hated or loved based on the writing”.

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Web novels are a good way for readers to get access to stories and for writers to hone their skills. Not only are they free, they also let readers give feedback to the author, allowing both the reader and writer to advance their writing skills, as well as giving readers a fresher perspective based on how writers think and write.