The earliest novel in China is?

The East Jin Dynasty's Gan Bao compiled the "Book of Searching for Gods" is China's earliest and a collection of mythological novels. Gan Bao, the word is now rising, Xin Cai (now Henan Xin Cai) people, the Eastern Jin Dynasty historians, literary scholars. He compiled the "Search for the gods", the original book has been scattered, the existing twenty volumes of this is the later from the "Beitang book notes", "Arts and Letters Classes Gathering", "Taiping Yuban" and other books from the collection of anonymous text and become. In addition to being influenced by the economic and political system of the society at that time, this mythological short story was also influenced by ancient myths and legends. It focuses on the stories of immortals and ghosts, and also contains some trivial records without storytelling, which is one of the main types of novels about gods and monsters that appeared in the Wei and Jin dynasties. Through various mythological stories, the book exposes some unfair and unreasonable social phenomena, and praises the heroic behaviors of those who are brave and resourceful and who do harm to the people. In addition, there are also some mythological novels that depict the love between men and women. The Book of Searching for Gods had a great influence on later generations. Especially part of the folklore, which is the essence of the book, has been passed down for a long time and has been loved by everyone. The literary value of Sou Shen Ji lies mainly in the fact that it has preserved these excellent myths and legends, providing extremely valuable information for future generations to study the development of ancient literature, especially the history of the evolution of novels.