When Yao Qizhong started writing his diaries, he had no idea it would become a book three years later, nor did he know he would become a media sensation and the talk of the food market he continues to work at.

"It wasn't my intention to publish a book," he said. "I started with recording my son's awards in martial arts performances, then I started recording how he grew up, then finally my family history."

Yao, 40, came to Beijing in 1997 from Fuyang, Anhui Province. Father to two sons and a daughter, he sells ginger and garlic to sustain his family. A farmer with an education that went only as far as the fourth grade, Yao might be the last person people would expect to pen a book.

However, he's not the first grassroots writer to get published in China. Just last year, a former security guard at Peking University also authored a book about his experience taking the college entry exam and getting into university.

Yao said as a folk author, writing means more than money and fame.

"We read about him from a media report … and we were curious about him," said Yu Genyong, editor at Beijing Times Chinese Press, which published Yao's book, A Vegetable Seller's Diary: A Struggling Life Told to the Next Generation, last month.

Yu was fascinated that an uneducated man had spent three years chronicling his life and wanted to know what kept him going. Yao said he receives motivation from the obstacles he meets.

"People around me, my wife included, all say keeping a diary is pointless," he said. "Many say I might be crazy, especially when it's cold outside and I'm sitting outside writing. But it doesn't matter what they say - I keep going."

There are many characters that Yao doesn't know how to write, so he keeps a dictionary next to him when he's writing. He picks up his pen as soon as customers walk away, using every spare minute. In the morning, he hides the notebook in his coat before going to work so that his wife won't find out.

It's rare for people at the bottom of the social ladder to write books, Yu said, especially someone with little education, but he thinks such folk stories serve an important role.

"I read his draft, 20,000 words, all handwritten, and it touched me," he said.

Yu said some people might think a vegetable seller writing a book was merely a scheme to gain fame, but this isn't the case for Yao. Before Beijing Times Chinese Press found Yao, several publishing houses, TV stations and film directors had already approached him, offering him big money for the book, but Yao wouldn't sell until the right opportunity came. In the end, he received 20,000 yuan ($3,230) for the work.

"He just wants to leave his children some strictly spiritual wealth, so that they can know the difficulties their father endured," Yu said.

Yao said many parents seek him out at the market about how to educate their children and teach the importance of hard work. He sees the positive influence of his book as better than fame.

His message will soon get an even wider audience, as the publisher has plans to translate Yao's book into English and Korean.