In the 1980s, Gao Jialin, a young man living in Gaojiagou in northern Shaanxi Province, was known to everyone in his village as the "top student." Although his family was poor, he was well read and had a heart higher than the sky, and was secretly determined to leave the countryside. The college entrance examination was his only chance to change his fate, but he unexpectedly failed. He did everything to become a private elementary school teacher, but the opportunity got taken away from him. Gao Jialin hits the bottom of his life, but is encouraged by Liu Qiaozhen to pick himself up and keep writing. Gao's uncle returns to the village and indirectly provides Gao with the opportunity to work as a journalist in the county. He meets with his like-minded classmate Huang Yaping in the county, but the silent guardianship of the country girl Qiaozhen and the passionate love of the Shanghai girl Huang Yaping put him in a difficult dilemma. After several struggles and several choices, he relies on a pen to bring himself to Shanghai. The test of fate came one after another, and Gao Jialin learned his place in college had been taken by his friend Shuangxing. Even so, Gao Jialin was not defeated. He strived to learn new knowledge in accordance with the times, and through the changes of the world, he wrote an extraordinary life story of an ordinary man in the tide of the times.