Werewolves, ethereal spirits, a motorcycle gang, relentlessly falling snow and a town’s menacing secret all converge in Alice Moss’s Mortal Kiss, a paranormal romance that Random House Children’s Books’ Ember imprint published this week as its first full-length original eBook novel. The book was a hit on the Internet last September and October, when it was serialized on the English-language site of Stardoll.com, the international teen virtual entertainment and social gaming Web site, reportedly drawing a million readers, 300,000 from the U.S. alone.

Initiated in partnership with Random House Children’s Books U.K., the online version of Moss’s debut novel ran on the site for 56 consecutive days, with a new chapter appearing each day. According to the U.S. publisher, the Mortal Kiss’s Stardoll Fan Club currently boasts almost 92,000 members.

“We originally thought of publishing a trade paperback version,” says Robin Corey, v-p and publishing director of Robin Corey Books. “But we’d been talking about doing eBook-onlys for a while, and hadn’t yet done a full-length novel initially as an eBook, so we decided this was a great book to experiment with that format, since it started online.”

Discussing Mortal Kiss’s appeal, Corey, who acquired and edited and did some rewriting of the novel, observes that it has plot elements of earlier popular paranormal romances—and more. “The author draws on inventive use of mythology to create the characters, which adds depth to the story,” she says. “We had some of our younger staff members read it, and they all loved it. And one of our marketing staffers printed out part of the manuscript to bring home to her 15-year-old daughter, who stayed up till the middle of the night finishing it. The next day she texted her mother from school, impatiently demanding, ‘Where is the rest of the book?’ ”

A still untitled sequel to Mortal Kiss, also originating from Random House Children’s Books U.K., will be serialized next August on Stardoll.com and will have a subsequent incarnation released in this country. “We will definitely do an eBook of Moss’s second novel, too, and possible a trade paperback as well,” says Corey. “It depends on the feedback we get for Mortal Kiss.”

Mortal Kiss by Alice Moss. Random House/Ember, $7.99 eBook Mar. ISBN 978-0-375-98879-0