Malaysian Author Steven Steel Wins Watty Awards With Debut Novel

EIGHTEEN-year-old Penangite Tey Feng Nian, who goes by the pseudonym Steven Steel on writing community Wattpad, won a Watty Award for his science fiction novel Someone’s In My Head. The debut effort told the story of a man named Jarod Wickernham, whose conscience is conquered by someone else after an automobile mishap.

Wattpad is most widely used by teens from 13-20. It’s a place for young, aspiring writers to share their efforts — works published on the website vary from articles and stories to fan-fiction and poems.

According to Star2, this came as a total surprise to the young wordsmith.

“[…] I had really hoped that I could win a Watty, but from past experience, I knew that overly-high expectations will inevitably lead to a larger disappointment at the end when things don’t turn out the way I want them to,” he explained to the publication.

Someone’s In My Head is the first-born of The Wickernham Trilogy. The 30-chapter science fiction novel took Tey Feng almost a year to write, and an additional four months to edit.

Although the idea of publishing his work for free online didn’t appeal to him at first, his yearning for a fan-base to support his future literary ventures eventually eliminated his hesitation.

His efforts paid off — Someone’s In My Head won the 2015 Watty Award in the Science Fiction Novel category and at present has clocked approximately 243,000 reads.

The novel is now also available for pre-order on Amazon in paperback. It’s video trailer can also be checked out .