There were others before Wright who wrote in the evangelical mode.

Edward Payson Roe was also a minister who turned to print. His books followed the pattern of a religious hero's or heroine's efforts to convince a doubter (usually of the opposite sex) to become a Christian. The hero was always successful with the help of a great catastrophe as a climax.

Wright more directly followed the work of Charles M. Sheldon, also a preacher, who had written a series of essays that he read to his congregation and developed into In His Steps (1896), which predicted how Jesus would live if he lived today. Wright acknowledged Sheldon's influence in his first work, That Printer of Udell's, but even the critics agreed that Wright's work was better. Neither Sheldon nor Roe matched the prolific writings of Harold Bell Wright.