After penning "Little Tich" in 1911 (as ghostwriter for the music hall entertainer of the same name) he issued the first Fu Manchu novel, "The Mystery of Dr. Fu-Manchu", serialised from October 1912 to June 1913. It was an immediate success, with its fast-paced story of Denis Nayland Smith and Dr. Petrie facing the worldwide conspiracy of the "Yellow Peril". The Fu Manchu stories, together with his more conventional detective series characters—Paul Harley, Gaston Max, Red Kerry, Morris Klaw (an occult detective), and the Crime Magnet—made Rohmer one of the most successful and financially rewarded authors of the 1920s and 1930s.