You’ve Got Mail: A Cautionary Tale by Hei Dan Bai

This is an ongoing translation, but I feel like I need to write about it. 

The translation is available here: https://blackbox-tl.com/novels/ygmct/

Almost forty years old government official Wu Xingzi from a small village finds his life so boring and bland that he wants to commit suicide at his 40th birthday, and he doesn't want to die a virgin, but here is a problem: he lives in the middle of nowhere, he doesn't have a lot of money, high social status or handsome face, and he is also gay. A man from a village tells him about Peng society: an association for gentlemen who want to find themselves a male partner. Wu Xingzi joins this society to find another humble middle-aged man to be a partner with. All he gets are a bunch of hand-drawn dick pics (he enjoys them very much) and a local Christian Grey on his tail.

General Guan, the local Christian Grey, is a super beautiful (it is not surprising he hasn't found a wife yet, even the most beautiful maidens seem mediocre in comparison to him) powerful young general and also an asshole who expect other people to tremble in front of him. He seduces poor Wu Xingzi quickly but here is a thing: Wu Xingzi isn't Anastasia, he is a regular man, he has an established life and is very suspicious about general Guan.

I don't think it's a proper read for a person who wants to read a compelling romance. It more like a deconstructivist take on a stereotypical trashy romance novel and trashy BL. General Guan is portrayed as a magnificent asshole but he treated like a regular asshole. He has a long-lasting crush on his former teacher, but it isn't treated like a beautiful one-side romance, it's treated as an unhealthy shit which led characters nowhere. 

I love how characters are written in this novel, especially the two main characters.

The author mockingly depicts general Guan as one of these problematic and fucked up but extremely hot love interests, who is good at everything and can make you come for ten times during one night, but also general Guan has more depth. He is not an asshole for the sake of being an asshole and turn into a good guy after falling in love. He is an arrogant young master from a very influential and rich family, he has a high-level position it the military, and he expects people with lower social standing to seek for his attention and compete for it with other people around him. Especially his lovers who can gain something from him (it was pretty common for a high-ranking man in Ancient China to give their male lovers a government official position of something like that). He is smart and manipulative, and he is used to playing with his lovers and expects them to participate in all these manipulation-jealousy-seeking for attention games. I don't feel for him but he is a well-written character and he doesn't change at the moment, his character development seems pretty realistic to me in the translated part of the novel, and I like how the author makes his self-absorbed self work against him. 

And Wu Xingzi is my favorite! He is the most relatable character in a romance novel I've ever seen. I don't know what it says about me because he literally wanted to commit suicide at the beginning of the novel. But overall he is just a chill guy who just wants a dick, tasty food, and some distraction from his extremely boring life. I like how he is not willing to change his way of living immediately, and how he doesn't trust general Guan. I like how he doesn't participate in all these "love games" with ignoring each other, causing jealousy, etc, and how he is completely deaf to all attempts to manipulate him into participating in this bullshit. He never plotted and schemed against other people, and it kinda helps him. Yes, he doesn't see throw all these manipulators surrounding general Guan, but at the same time, he is insensitive to their attempts to offend him in the way they usually offend people of their social standing. Also, I think he is a good example of an older character in romance because he is attached to his usual life (despite it bored him to death) and very cautious about any changes, it's hard for him to fall in love and he has very down to earth view on life. 

Another good thing about this novel: it deals very well with social inequality (I can't believe I'm writing about social inequality in a cheesy BL novel): from casual lack of respect for people from lower classes to the fact that Wu Xingzi, a poor man from a village counts old in his 39, and it's rare for people from a village to stay active and healthy after 50, and general Guan, a rich trained man from a big city, can live way longer. Also, Wu Xingzi doesn't have a courtesy name. 

Of course, I have some criticism:

1) I don't think a subplot with general Guan and his crush was developed enough. There should be a gradual change in their relationship, but in the novel, it feels chopped. It's like there should be some additional scenes with these two. 

2) Sexual scenes in this novel are highly unrealistic. it's appropriate for this kind of story to have very long and kinky sex-scenes, but they are just... anatomically weird. They look like sex scenes from 30000 words long PWP fic with five lines of kinks in the description where characters have mind-blowing sex for three days straight. 

Tbh, normally I wouldn't read such a novel because I prefer healthy friends to lovers romances, but this trainwreck of a romance is somehow very satisfying. It's fucked up and funny and I love it.

4 out of 5 stars this far.