Happy Heroes is my favorite of Gu Long’s works, and the only one I would readily recommend to other people.

Like many writers, Gu Long often leaned toward tragedy. Truly happy endings are rare in his fiction. Among the longer works, only Big Shots and Happy Heroes arrive at a genuinely bright conclusion without killing off any important characters. Just as striking, this novel avoids melodrama and never indulges in meaningless slaughter. Maybe the Gu Long of around 1972 was simply in his most carefree mood.

The heroes here are a group of idle, penniless people. They live in a place called Prosperity Manor. The house belongs to Wang Dong, and inside it there is basically nothing except a bed and a quilt. Guo Dalu originally shows up intending to rob the place. Yan Qi is only passing through. Lin Taiping is someone Yan Qi picked up along the way.

And from these four odds and ends comes the warmest, funniest story in all of Gu Long’s world.

A shabby house, a vivid world

One of the pleasures of the novel is that almost nobody around them is ordinary. The pawnbroker in town, the tavern keeper, the shopkeeper selling odds and ends, even the old man on the road—none of them are as simple as they look. And besides Guo Dalu, the other three protagonists all have roots in the martial world through their families. Years later, quite a few of these elements clearly found their way into the hit TV series My Own Swordsman.

Using a single house as the anchor, then letting all kinds of people come and go through it, gives the book a structure that almost feels like a road movie turned inward. It is an easy way to generate stories, perhaps, but here it works beautifully.

Gu Long was always funny. But in most of his books, the jokes are scattered. In Happy Heroes, they erupt in concentrated form. This is where his comic talent is gathered at full strength.

Take the scene where Lin Taiping looks for basic washing supplies:

Wang Dong could not help asking, “What are you looking for?”

Lin Taiping said, “A washbasin, a face towel, and a cup for rinsing.”

Wang Dong laughed. “Not only have I not seen those things for a very long time, some of them I’ve never even heard of.”

It was as if Lin Taiping had suddenly been struck by a whip. His mouth fell open. Stammering, he said, “Y-you mean you don’t even wash your faces?”

Wang Dong said, “Of course we wash. A small wash every three days, a big wash every five.”

Lin Taiping said, “What is a small wash? What is a big wash?”

Wang Dong said, “Yan Qi, show him.”

Yan Qi stretched lazily. “I washed yesterday. Today it’s your turn.”

Wang Dong sighed. “Then at least bring over the washing equipment.”

Just then Guo Dalu came in carrying two buckets of water. Yan Qi used the broken bowl to scoop up over half a bowl of water, then took down from the wall a piece of cloth, yellow and black, whose original color was impossible to guess.

Only then did Wang Dong reluctantly sit up. First he took a mouthful of water and held it in his mouth. Then he spread out the towel in one hand, gargled vigorously, and with a pffft sprayed the water onto the cloth. He wiped his face with it casually and let out a breath of relief. “All right, washed.”

Lin Taiping looked as if he had seen a ghost. His face turned green. “Th-this counts as a small wash?”

Wang Dong said, “Not a small wash. A big wash. If a small wash were this troublesome, what would become of us?”

That is exactly the kind of humor this book lives on: absurd, poor, shameless, and somehow deeply lovable.

Four friends, each with a secret

The novel’s emotional core is just as strong as its comedy. These four are friends, but every one of them has a secret. Even the chapter titles make this clear: “Wang Dong’s Secret,” “Guo Dalu’s Secret,” “Lin Taiping’s Secret.” Yan Qi does not get the same treatment—being a girl, she gets special treatment, and besides, the mysterious episode involving Nangong Chou is already, in effect, Yan Qi’s secret.

What is a secret?

A secret is the one thing you can possess and enjoy entirely alone.

Maybe it brings happiness; maybe it brings pain. Whatever it is, it belongs wholly to you.

If it is pain, you bear it alone. If it is joy, you still cannot share it.

Not even with your closest friend.

Because once a second person knows it, it is no longer really a secret.

As Gu Long gradually uncovers the hidden lives of these four people, the friends become open with one another at last—and that is also when the story is ready to end.

Wang Dong: the best character in the book

Among the four, Wang Dong is the most fully realized character.

His story is about what one can let go of and what one cannot.

When he was young, a mysterious person taught him martial arts in a graveyard every night. This continued for three years. Once he had mastered those skills, Wang Dong went out into the jianghu.

Later he returned home and retired from that life, only to find that his parents had died one after another. This was something he could not put down.

So Wang Dong stopped moving.

He would not move even when Guo Dalu came to rob him. Instead, he merely told Guo Dalu to close the door on the way out.

That is Wang Dong in the state of not letting go.

Then the kite appears, old companions from his wandering days come to divide up spoils, and the Red Lady falls into danger. Wang Dong steps forward. That is the moment of letting go.

In the middle part of the novel, through the mouth of Commander Jin, it is revealed that the mysterious teacher was actually Wang Dong’s father, a man desperate to see his son succeed.

And Wang Dong’s response to that truth is not rage, but release.

This kind of portrayal—an adult changing inwardly, slowly, through buried grief and recognition—is very rare in Gu Long’s fiction.

Yan Qi, the finest girl Gu Long ever wrote

Yan Qi is the best girl in all of Gu Long.

She is called Yan Qi because by the time she makes her entrance, she has already “died” seven times. Later, during Lin Taiping’s story, she dies twice more. By the end of the novel, strictly speaking, Yan Qi ought to have become Yan Jiu.

She loves to smile, and when she smiles her nose wrinkles first, like a cute steamed bun.

But her finest moments are when she snaps back at people.

Yan Qi sprang to her feet. “I’m full now.”

The girl in white let her eyes flicker and smiled sweetly. “How is it that you become full the moment you see me?”

Yan Qi said coolly, “Because you’re even more adorable than a pig’s trotter.”

For a very long time, I wanted a girlfriend who could talk back the way Yan Qi does.

Unfortunately, there are not many people who can really do that, and even fewer who can outdo me at it. The only two or three who ever managed to leave me speechless were never interested in me anyway.

Fate likes its jokes.

And no, I absolutely refuse to admit that Yan Xiaoliu was modeled on Yan Qi. Absolutely not. The real prototype was Yan Shisan.

Guo Dalu, annoying and indispensable

I have never liked Guo Dalu’s personality very much.

He is impulsive and often thoughtless.

But he is still the primary protagonist, the glue that holds the other three together.

And above all, he is sincere.

Without him, the others would have had a hard time opening their hearts. Without him, this marvelous combination of personalities could never have come fully alive.

There is also a small scene that captures the novel’s strange and wonderful mood better than any summary could. Guo Dalu sits under the eaves for a long time, because he has absolutely nothing else to do. He is the kind of person who would rather wander around aimlessly, watching people pass on the road or stray dogs fighting in a corner, than stay shut up indoors. But now all he can do is sit there in a daze.

Icicles hang from the eaves, some long and some short. Guo Dalu knows there are exactly sixty-three of them: twenty-six long, thirty-seven short. He knows because he has counted them seventeen or eighteen times.

The weather is bitterly cold. There is nobody on the street, not even a stray dog in sight. He has lived through more than twenty winters and cannot remember any day colder than these. When someone is truly unlucky, even the weather seems determined to oppose him.

He often has bad luck, but never as badly as now.

And misfortune is contagious. If one person is truly unlucky, nobody around him is likely to fare well either.

So he is not sitting there alone.

Yan Qi, Wang Dong, and Lin Taiping are all there too, all staring blankly.

Then Lin Taiping suddenly asks, “How many icicles do you think there are?”

Yan Qi says, “Sixty-three.”

Wang Dong says, “Twenty-six long, thirty-seven short.”

Guo Dalu cannot help laughing. “So you counted them too.”

Yan Qi says, “I’ve counted them forty times.”

Wang Dong says, “Only three for me. I can’t bear to count them too often.”

Guo Dalu asks, “Can’t bear to?”

Wang Dong replies, “Because I want to save them and count them slowly.”

That is Happy Heroes in miniature: poverty, boredom, cold, absurdity—and companionship so real that even counting icicles becomes unforgettable.

Why this novel stays with me

I cannot be as lazy as Wang Dong, as sharp as Yan Qi, or as sincere as Guo Dalu.

Being a person is difficult.

But that is exactly why this book matters so much. In a body of work so often marked by loneliness, bloodshed, and fatal endings, Happy Heroes dares to imagine something else: friends who are broke, foolish, secretive, ridiculous, and still capable of making life feel warm.

Who says heroes must be lonely?

These heroes are happy.