Fun · A Visual Companion
Wesley's Adventures倪匡 · 卫斯理系列 · 1963 — 2004
145 books across four decades. A Hong Kong newspaperman, a gangster's daughter, a wolf-girl raised in the jungle, blue-blooded aliens, ghosts, spirits, time-loops, and one very persistent man with too many friends. This page is a small map of who's who, who knows whom, and how it all unfolded.
Things the data revealed
A handful of findings worth a moment of attention before you dig in.
- 白素 is named 3.4× as often as 卫斯理
In raw text counts, Bai Su gets 25,273 mentions to Wesley's 7,471. Because Wesley narrates in first person — he calls himself 我, and everyone else calls his wife by name.
- 3 years tied at 8 books each: 1969, 1970, 1991
Ni Kuang's record output. 1991 alone holds three 阴间系列 entries (#90, #91, #94) plus two of 探险系列 (#89, #95) — five named-arc books in twelve months.
- The 1973–78 hiatus was just over 5 years long
Between #45 《新年》 (Jan 1973) and #46 《头发》 (Mar 1978), nothing. The longest gap between any two consecutive Wesley books in the entire 41-year run.
- 温宝裕 is named 111 times per book he's in
More densely than Wesley himself (52 per book on average). The teenage trouble-magnet is the most repeatedly-addressed character in the later run.
- 6 of 55 canonical characters are not human
Blue-bloods from Titan, alien envoys, awakened spirits, ghosts of the underworld, transformed mothers. The series tilts hard toward science-fiction and the supernatural — particularly in 探险 and 阴间 sagas.
- 145 books, 89,072 canon-name hits, 1874 chapter files
The 卫斯理 corpus is enormous. Even discounting first-person 我 and pronouns, just the 55 named characters trip off the page tens of thousands of times across four decades.
Who knows whom
Hover to highlight a thread. Click a node to read their dossier. Drag to rearrange — the simulation snaps back.
The cast
Everyone the page knows about, sorted by importance and debut.
The most connected
By raw count of relationships in the canon. Wesley is usually touching everything; the surprise is who's second.
Who travels with whom
Top character pairs by number of books in which both appear at least once. Empirical, not canonical — derived directly from name counts across the 145 books.
- 1131+Jaccard 90%
- 278+Jaccard 54%
- 378+Jaccard 60%
- 468+Jaccard 47%
- 567+Jaccard 51%
- 664+Jaccard 78%
- 762+Jaccard 43%
- 857+Jaccard 42%
- 956+Jaccard 39%
- 1056+Jaccard 43%
- 1154+Jaccard 37%
- 1254+Jaccard 41%
Where they actually show up
Each row is a character. Each column is a book in order. Darker cell = the character's name appears more in that book. Counted by literal name occurrences in the source text, so the protagonist (who narrates in first person) looks quieter than his wife.
Pick a book, see who's in it
Slide through 145 books or roll the dice. Cast ranking is empirical — by how often each name appears in that book's text.
钻石花
- 363
- 228
- 127
- 125
- 85
- 9
Six degrees of Wesley
Trace the shortest social path between any two characters in the canon.
- married to (#2)
- is child of (#2)
Of what stock
The series catalogs an unusual menagerie. Here's who's what.
Forty-one years, 145 books
Each square is a book. Taller stacks = more output that year. Empty gaps are years Ni Kuang put the series down.
The pace of a forty-one-year project
Days between consecutive books, by publication start. The spike around book #46 is the 1973–78 hiatus — 1884 days, almost five years off.
The ensemble grew slowly, then all at once
Cumulative count of named, canonical characters introduced by year. Hover for what landed when.
The named arcs
A handful of books were grouped into named sub-series. Plus 15 books are direct sequels or 附篇 to earlier ones — Wesley refused to stay done.
探险系列 · Exploration Saga
4 books- 1.探险#86 · 1990
- 2.继续探险#87 · 1990
- 3.烈火女#89 · 1991
- 4.祸根#95 · 1991
阴间系列 · Underworld Saga
5 books- 1.从阴间来#90 · 1991
- 2.到阴间去#91 · 1991
- 3.阴差阳错#94 · 1991
- 4.阴魂不散#96 · 1992
- 5.许愿#97 · 1992
思想仪系列 · Thought-meter Saga
4 books- 1.将来#102 · 1993
- 2.改变#103 · 1993
- 3.闯祸#105 · 1994
- 4.只限老友#145 · 2004
成精系列 · Spirit Saga
3 books- 1.原形#115 · 1995
- 2.真实幻境#124 · 1997
- 3.成精变人#125 · 1997
All 15 sequels & 附篇
- #49天书奇门续集
- #65十七年命运附篇
- #74血统尸变续集
- #82真相错手续集
- #88圈套玩具续集
- #104暗号之二转世暗号续集
- #107解脱生死锁续集
- #108遗传还阳续集
- #120卖命买命续集
- #127移魂怪物未来身份续集
- #132解开密码密码续集
- #136行动救星闭关开关续集
- #140身外化身乾坤挪移续集
- #143须弥芥子一个地方续集
- #145只限老友考验续集、思想仪系列第四集
The man who would not stop writing
Born in Shanghai, fled to Hong Kong in 1957 with no money and a heroic capacity for prose. Started 卫斯理 in 1963 in a daily newspaper. Put it down for five years, picked it back up, and kept going until 2004. Wrote dozens of other series too — film screenplays, martial-arts novels, sci-fi, anti-Communist polemics. One of the four 才子 of post-war Hong Kong letters, alongside Jin Yong, Cai Lan, and Huang Zhan.