Book excerpt: This is the first scholarly attempt to write a history of cyber literary criticism in China. The author uses the Internet as the departure point, literature as the horizontal axis, and criticism as the vertical axis, to draw a detailed trajectory of the development of cyber literary criticism in China. The book comprises two parts. The first part focuses on the representation of historical facts about cyber literary criticism, covering five topics: the evolution of cyber literary criticism in the context of the new media; major types of cyber literary critics and their criticism; academic achievements in cyber literary studies; the form, contents, and rhetorical expressions of so-called netizens’ critical commentaries; and important events in the history of cyber literary criticism. The second part discusses the historical changes in literary criticism as responses to cyber literature, covering another five topics: the conceptual transformation in literary criticism of the Internet era; the establishment of evaluation criteria for cyber literature; changes in the function of cyber literary criticism; changes in the constitution of cyber literary critics; and the impact of cyber literary criticism. This book will be an essential read to students and scholars of East Asian Studies, literary criticism, and those who are interested in cyber literature in general.