[Chinese BL novel] 首富穿书后只想当咸鱼 by size5 / The richest man wants to be a salted fish after wearing a book*

(*title is mtl'd)

Summary: The original summary is very misleading, which I'm not a fan of. When summary is different from the content I actually hae anticipation of things mentioned in the summary, but reality and imagination are too far off. Gu Bai was the richest man in his last life, he died suddenly and wore a book, things he knew were limited - he was a cannon fodder and this is a family fighting for inheritance novel he read ages ago. After arriving he did not participate in the initial fighting after their father faked his death and left the Gu family, before he was called back to marry. His spouse in name only is Chu Zeshen, coming from a renowned family in S city. They initially agreed to be a contracted couple, but later Zeshen developed feelings for Gu Bai and chased him.

I'd say right away, I picked it up in-between reading another novel which was quite long, but I did not expect I'd be so bored. First of all summary on JJ does not represent the novel and did not meet expectations. Second of all the summary on JJ is pretty bad to me, because it felt like Zeshen threw documents around just for Gu Bai to read them and find if they're good or not. But this happened only very few times in the novel itself, so Zeshen never used Gu Bai to this extent, on the contrary, he is used to helping Gu Bai dealing with his family. Thirdly, there was no substantial thrill going on, the romance was okay, but everything seemed underwhelming and the emphasis on "being lazy" repeatedly mentioned in the novel makes you care less and less. Indeed doing nothing and getting money is the ultimate dream of all people, but sometimes I really dislike salted fish characters that are truly lazy in everything they do, by the end of the novel I started to skip a lot of text and it didn't really matter.

Gu family structure:

Gu Haisheng - the father of the family, in the beginning he used his fake death to probe the attitude of his four children. He used Gu Bai mostly as a scapegoat and not really intending giving his equity.

Gu Jiazi and Gu Ruilin - eldest daughter and son. Born in the first marriage, their mother divorced and immigrated, keeps in contact with her children, but is not mentioned much. 

Gu Bai (original) - born in the second marriage, the marriage didn't last long, his mother divorced and also immigrated, does not keep in contact with original owner, thus he became a marginal figure.

Gu Bai (transimgrated) - lost his parents at an early age, then took Gu family into his hands, but was hindered a lot by the never-ending chain of "relatives" who came to show their presence and wanting to have a piece of Gu family, worked his entire life before travelling into the book, was the richest man, but did not enjoy any of the benefits.

Gu Yi - born in the third marriage, her mother is the current mistress of the Gu family. She was often instigated by her mother to treat other siblings as enemies, but later because of some events she knew that only the current Gu Bai was actually good to her and won't do anything bad.

Chu family structure:

Chu Zeshen - the current head of the Chu family, lost his parents at a young age, was trained by his grandparents before taking the position of an heir.

Grandpa Chu - lovely grandfather tbh, he liked Gu Bai, was very open-minded and was that needed family to Gu Bai.

Chu Peiwen - Zeshen's uncle. His father is grandpa Chu's brother. So his family is like a second room. Has no business talent, but instigated a lot of trouble, was demoted due to extramarital affair. His family was broken apart when this came to light in front of his family members.

Mocha - Gu Bai's dog (original), border collie, but was cared for and loved by Zeshen and the Chu family a lot. Handsome boy who is smart and likes praise :)

Storyline:

Is too simple. When Gu Bai arrived he moved out. He basically didn't want to do anything. Later he was invited to meet the future husband Chu Zeshen, knowing that it won't be a bad thing he agreed, they started as a contract couple and basically lived together and Mocha. Chu granda was very fond of Gu Bai. Later it became evident that Zeshen fell in love, but they don't have any backstory, he just fell in love when married. They developed naturally, because Zeshen was very attentive and took initiative to be caring. As a result when things came to light a lot of time passed, but they basically came together in a day, since they were already natural, but now love was involved. From time to time several mentioned above members appeared, but it wasn't anything big. The uncle of the Chu family was sent away, everyone except his family knew about his affair. Only much later when Gu and Chu held a cooperative banquet/marriage announcement, he dared to come back, but then at the scene his affair was mentioned to his family, his wife knew, but children did not, so family fell apart at the scene.

Gu brother and sister also came from time to time, but I'd say their methods are clumpsy, they Ruilin wanted to send his lover to seduce Zeshen and later involve him in a scandal, but things did not go their way, even final drugging incident was quite underwhelming, because Gu Bai and Zeshen are not kids who are easily led by their noses. Anyway, this incident failed but the relationship of the second child with a man was exposed instead. He wanted to stir trouble from abroad with Chu Peiwen, but it failed.

In the end very uneventful novel, spent mostly on a couch where Gu Bai liked to lounge. And the mentioning of being lazy is just suffocating. Lazy here and lazy there. Even his attempts from escaping and fishing at work are not cute. That's why I don't like his character, either be a salted fish or do something. It's not like he's not smart. No one like him would be able to see mistakes in a document he saw for the first time without any background what this plan is for, the company estimates etc. Me being sarcastic indeed, because it's also stupid how Zeshen is described as business tycoon, but Gu Bai noticed mistakes he missed.

RATE: 2,5/5. All those stars are given to the author just for the sake of romance and that characters ar enot brain-dead and don't act like routine mosnters, but the entertainment value of this novel to me is 0. It has no ups an downs, no stakes, just a lazy novel like it's protagonist. This novel is also unlucky, because the novel I've been reading and took a pause is super entertaining. And I mind you, this novel is 92 chapters long, so it's even more staggering that something this long is nothing more than.. this.