NovelAI has a Lorebook, Memory, branching edit history and fine-tuned models, with an English/Japanese interface. Compared with Maliang for long Chinese serials.
NovelAI is a mature AI story-writing tool for English and Japanese: the Lorebook is brought in automatically by keyword, Memory and the Author’s Note stay in place, every generation is recorded in a traceable branching history, and there are in-house fine-tuned models and anime image generation. But its interface is only in English and Japanese, and official material does not describe product-level support for writing in Chinese. For long Chinese web-novel serials, Maliang offers a Chinese volume-and-chapter table of contents, character cards, story archives organized after each chapter is written, revision comparison in the editor and Chinese genre reference.
An author writing a long Chinese fantasy hears that NovelAI’s Lorebook works well: set keywords for every character and place name, and they are brought in automatically whenever the text mentions them. He tries it for a few days and likes the feeling of writing paragraph by paragraph with AI, retrying and picking one when he isn’t satisfied. By chapter thirty, a few things start to bother him: the interface is in English; the protagonist has changed sects and lost an arm, and he has to edit the entries himself; and to see the structure of the whole book by volume and chapter, or exactly which sentences AI changed, he also has to find his own way. He wonders whether his Chinese serial should move to a tool designed around volumes, chapters and story archives.
On narrow screens, scroll sideways to see all columns.
| Dimension | Maliang Writer | NovelAI | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Interface language | ✅ Chinese interface, for Chinese-language authors | ❌ The official site says the interface supports English and Japanese; Chinese is not listed | |
| Writing in Chinese | ✅ A Chinese-language product; the writer agent writes Chinese body text from this book’s earlier text and style samples | ⚠️ The models page says GLM-4.6 is strong in English, Japanese and Chinese; no official material found on product-level support for writing in Chinese | |
| How setting material is handed to AI | ✅ Characters, settings, foreshadowing and storylines are cards, the master outline is stored separately and style samples are documents; AI reads them as needed when writing and can also edit them as you ask | ✅ Lorebook: each entry has activation keywords and is brought in automatically when a keyword appears in recent text; it can also be set to always on | |
| Always-on information | ✅ Material such as the master outline and style samples can be read while writing; style preferences can be saved in the AI settings | ✅ Memory goes at the very front of the context; the Author’s Note sits near the end and has a strong influence, and the official site recommends updating it often | |
| Settings changing with the plot | ✅ After a chapter is written and this stretch of writing ends, story archives are organized: character states, relationships, locations, foreshadowing; anything that conflicts with existing settings is listed as pending confirmation; can be turned off | ⚠️ No official material found on updating the Lorebook automatically; the author maintains the entries | |
| Volume and chapter structure | ✅ Volumes, chapters and chapter outlines are in the left-hand table of contents, and new chapters AI writes appear there directly | ⚠️ No official material found | |
| Undo and redo | ✅ Undo the current round, branch from before the round (sharing the same manuscript as the original conversation), or edit and resend | ✅ The edit history works like a branching timeline and supports undo, redo and retry; you can pick one of several generations at the same spot and keep writing from it | |
| Revision comparison | ✅ AI changes are marked on the original in the editor as red deletions and green additions, each of which can be kept or restored | ⚠️ No official material found on comparing changes one by one | |
| Models | ✅ A choice of several models; the model that writes the body text can be chosen separately, see the in-product list for specifics | ✅ In-house models: Xialong (fine-tuned on GLM-4.6), Erato (based on Llama 3), Kayra and others, plus GLM-4.6 | |
| Genre reference for Chinese web novels | ✅ When starting a book, consult the character and structure breakdowns of more than 1,500 popular serials in the public book library; the chapter-ending check is benchmarked against more than 2,000 popular web novels and about 56,000 chapter endings | ⚠️ No official material found | |
| Illustrations | ⚠️ Not covered here; Maliang focuses on writing text | ✅ Built-in anime-style image generation (NovelAI Diffusion) | |
| Price | ✅ Free sign-up to try, then credits are deducted by usage | ✅ Paper is a free trial (email verification required); Tablet $10/month, Scroll $15/month, Opus $25/month, billed in US dollars (checked 2026-10-11) |
✅ Confirmed in official material or in the product ⚠️ Partly supported, or not stated in official material ❌ Officially not supported · Competitor information comes from their public material.
Volumes, chapters and chapter outlines are in the left-hand table of contents; characters, settings, foreshadowing and storylines are individual cards, the master outline is stored separately and style samples are documents. AI reads them as needed when writing; what the author sees are the cards and the table of contents, where the new chapters and settings AI writes appear directly.
After a chapter is written and this stretch of writing ends, the background organizes this chapter’s archive: character states, relationships, locations, foreshadowing. Anything that conflicts with existing settings is listed as pending confirmation, and you decide whether to change the setting to match the text or change the text. It can be turned off.
When you reach a new volume, characters, places and foreshadowing that only appeared in earlier volumes are moved into the archive; AI no longer consults them when writing new chapters, but they can still be looked up when needed, and a character goes back into regular use when they return.
NovelAI’s strengths are real: the Lorebook brings settings in automatically by keyword and also supports case-sensitive regular expressions and conditions where several keywords appear together; Memory and the Author’s Note let the author directly control what AI remembers and which way it writes; the Context Viewer shows what is actually sent to AI; the edit history works like a branching timeline, and undo, retry and picking results are all smooth; the models are fine-tuned in-house on open-source bases, there is anime image generation, and the web version needs no installation and works on a phone. For authors who write stories in English or Japanese and like passing the story back and forth with AI paragraph by paragraph, it is well worth a try.
Every product suits some scenarios; the advice here covers only one: serialized long-form fiction in Chinese.
When trying NovelAI and Maliang Writer, start with the same original material and record the whole process: preparing materials, editing the text and taking the work with you when you leave the tool. Actual use decides the result; no side is assumed to win.
Below is a same-task trial checklist, not a finished comparison experiment. You can use the original teaching material “Jiehuo City” or a manuscript you have the right to handle; record the preparation, the output and the author’s edits for each tool.
Give both tools the same protagonist, core rules and reading preferences; compare the opening directions first, then organize the master outline, the first volume outline and the outlines for the first three chapters.
Check: Can it tell the roles of the three outline levels apart? Can the author confirm a plan before it continues? Were settings that hadn't been settled yet quietly written in as fact?
Use the same book-opening kitUse the same old manuscript you have the right to handle, specify how the last chapter ends and the goal of the next chapter; try writing one scene first, without changing the previous twenty chapters.
Check: What material did you prepare? Did character positions, items and open threads carry over? How are candidate drafts told apart from adopted ones?
See the import-and-continue task checklistPick a real rule that affects earlier chapters; first ask it to list the affected chapters and the evidence, then let the author choose the scope of the change.
Check: Does it say which parts it did not check? Can you review the changes first? Did it wrongly edit text outside the task or write an unadopted plan into the material?
See how to change a settingActually try keeping the text, the order of volumes and chapters, character profiles and world rules, and check whether the output is suitable for further editing; list what cannot be taken along.
Check: Are the format and order recognizable? What material is inside the platform account, what is in local files, and what is in the export? Do not infer usability from a marketing page alone.
Copy the task and result record cardRecord the models, plans or account conditions you actually used, and the time spent preparing materials and editing the text. Leave blank anything you have not tried or cannot confirm; do not let a feature name or a single generation stand in for the full experience.
No. The official site says the interface supports English and Japanese; Chinese is not listed. Maliang Writer is a long-form writing tool with a Chinese interface.
The official models page mentions GLM-4.6’s good Chinese ability, but no product-level description of support for writing in Chinese is found. You can use the free Paper trial to write a few passages and see how it does.
The Lorebook is a setting library: each entry has activation keywords, and when a keyword appears in recent text the entry’s content is brought to AI automatically; it can also be set to always on. The author has to maintain the content of the entries.
Official subscription page (checked 2026-10-11): Paper is a free trial, Tablet $10/month, Scroll $15/month, Opus $25/month, billed in US dollars; refer to the official site for current prices.
NovelAI’s terms of service do not list available countries, it charges only in US dollars, and its interface is in English and Japanese. Whether you can access and pay smoothly depends on your actual situation. Maliang Writer is a Chinese web tool that works as soon as you open it in a browser.
Its Lorebook, Memory and branching history can help; no official material found on a volume-and-chapter table of contents, automatic organization of character states, or change-by-change comparison. When writing a long Chinese novel, these may be for the author to manage.
NovelAI is strong in a keyword Lorebook, directly controllable memory and a branching generation history, and suits writing in English and Japanese; Maliang is built for long Chinese serials: a table of contents for volumes and chapters plus character cards, story archives organized after each chapter is written, change-by-change review in the editor, and reference from the character and structure breakdowns of more than 1,500 popular serials when starting a book.
For long Chinese web novels, look at tools designed for Chinese serials, such as Maliang Writer; you can also use a general-purpose large model directly, but you manage the story so far, settings and versions yourself.
Free sign-up to try, then credits are deducted by usage, with each round’s cost shown under the reply. There is a choice of several models, and the model that writes the body text can be chosen separately; see the in-product list for specifics.
Sudowrite is designed around a complete workflow for English-language fiction: the Story Bible runs from a brain dump all the way to prose, the Muse model is built for fiction, and there is a planning canvas and a mobile app. Chinese authors writing web-novel serials should note the officially mentioned “some output falls back to English”, and setting changes after a chapter is written are also mostly for the author to maintain. Maliang is built for long Chinese fiction: cards, story archives, revision comparison in the editor and genre reference for Chinese web novels.
Read the comparison →Novelcrafter gives control to the author: the setting library is brought in automatically when entries are mentioned, Progressions manage how settings change over time, the Matrix view tracks character appearances, and you choose and connect your own model. The price is that you connect the AI service yourself and maintain the setting library and prompts yourself. Maliang has models built in, organizes story archives after each chapter is written, lets you review AI changes one by one in the editor, and provides genre reference for Chinese web novels.
Read the comparison →Jasper was never a tool for writing novels: it describes itself as “an agent workspace built for modern marketing teams”, good at keeping a whole team’s marketing content in one brand voice and producing it in bulk in many languages. Official material shows no features aimed at long novels (setting library, chapter structure, version history and so on). For long Chinese fiction, Maliang offers a volume-and-chapter table of contents, character cards, story archives organized after each chapter is written and revision comparison in the editor.
Read the comparison →After signing up, create a book or import existing chapters, tell the AI which chapter to continue, then look at what it wrote, what it changed and what it recorded in the archive, and decide whether to move your long novel over.