To relieve the fresh water shortage, bi-layer systems have been widely applied to give high efficiencies of solar steam generation. In current work, a bi-layer system (C-wood) is obtained with the low-cost carbon particles as the light absorbing layer and the boxwood as the supporting layer. The application of wood could lead to both good water transportation and good local heat management in the system, and carbon particles could supply a high light absorptivity at a broad optical absorption wave bands (mostly larger than 98%), which results from the complex three-dimensional porous structure formed by the wide-size-distribution carbon particles. Because simultaneously possessing a high light absorptivity, good water transportation, and good local heat management, the C-wood system gives a 65% evaporation efficiency under an illumination power of 1 sun. This system is also durable for a future industry applications. Comparing the energy loss of the C-wood system in the evaporation process with the ones of other systems prepared in this work, we conclude that a low top-surface reflection of light of the C-wood system should be responsible for the high evaporation efficiency. It demonstrates that the carbon particle is a promising material for an application in solar steam generation systems for easily accessible resources, low cost, and effective light absorptivity.