Max Frei

Labyrinths of Echo — (2009-2011) Publisher: The millions-selling fantasy epic of the new Russian literary icon-a freeloading freebooter who finds a new home in a magical world "You never know when you'll luck out." Max Frei's novels have been a literary sensation in Russia since their debut in 1996, and have swept the fantasy world over. Presented here in English for the first time, The Stranger will strike a chord with readers of all stripes. Part fantasy, part horror, part philosophy, part dark comedy, the writing is united by a sharp wit and a web of clues that will open up the imagination of every reader. Max Frei was a twenty-something loser — a big sleeper (that is, during the day; at night he can't sleep a wink), a hardened smoker, and an uncomplicated glutton and loafer. But then he got lucky. He contacts a parallel world in his dreams, where magic is a daily practice. Once a social outcast, he's now known in his new world as the "unequalled Sir Max." He's a member of the Department of Absolute Order, formed by a species of enchanted secret agents; his job is to solve cases more extravagant and unreal than one could imagine-a journey that will take Max down the winding paths of this strange and unhinged universe.

The Stranger

Max Frei’s The Stranger is an interesting novel to say the least. For starters, I almost gave up on the book at three different times. Why? Well for one, it took a long while before the book started making sense to me, especially the setting, the story and the novel’s direction. It took even longer for me to get used to The Stranger’s peculiar brand of humor, not to mention the author’s liberal use of exclamation points. And finally, I just wasn’t able to connect with the protagonist Max, which was particularly galling since the entire novel is written from Max’s point-of-view, although I did eventually get over it. In short, I feel The Stranger is not the kind of book that readers will be able to delve into and immediately enjoy. Instead, it will take time to get used to the novel’s many idiosyncrasies, but if readers can accomplish that, then The Stranger will reward you.

To begin with, The Stranger is incredibly imaginative bolstered by an undeniable charm — think Harry Potter meets Dr. Seuss. In fact, I believe the book’s most striking attribute is its creativeness — a creativeness that extends throughout the entire city of Echo and the world beyond and includes all of its inhabitants, traditions (sleeping on floor beds, houses with 5-6 bathrooms is considered the norm, etc.) and more mundane things like the mode of dress, everyday expressions (Sinning Magicians!), transportation (amobilers), narcotics (Soup of Repose), and food (Jubatic Juice, kamra, Eliixer of Kaxar, Chakatta Pie). Other intriguing ideas include Silent Speech, self-inscribing tablets, buriwoks (talking birds with prodigious memories that act as a form of library or computer), their version of a prison, cats raised as livestock, the rituals they follow when another year ends, and the Quarter of Trysts where one-night stands are left to fate. Plus so many other wonderful ideas that it would require me writing a book just to cover them all.

The Stranger's second best attribute is the characters, which goes hand-in-hand with the book’s humor. Of the former, every single character that appears in The Stranger — apart from Max — is marked by a delightful name and a distinctive trait, but the most interesting characters by far are Max’s co-workers in the Minor Secret Investigative Force — Sir Juffin Hully, Most Venerable Head; Sir Shurf Lonli-Lokli, Master Who Snuffs Out Unnecessary Lives; Sir Manga Melifaro, Diurnal Representative of the Most Venerable Head; Sir Kofa Yox, Master Eavesdropper; Lady Melamori Blimm, Master of Pursuit of the Fleeing and Hiding; and Sir Lookfi Pence, Master Keeper of Knowledge. What makes these characters so interesting, apart from their charming names and personalities, is their interactions with one another and with Max, which consists of incessant banter and inside jokes like Max pretending to be from the Barren Lands, making fun of the incompetent General Boboota Box, and the differences between our world and theirs:

Well, this is nothing very exciting. Just a female dog. And this ... how should I say it, Shurf — a man who is undeserving of respect and who has serious problems with the plumbing in his backside. It’s a word that describes stupid people, although the root is directly connected to the process of reproduction.

Now this expression may be used interchangeably with the straightforward human expression “go away,” but it makes the one on the receiving end doubt his own ability to procreate. And this is a kind of animal, and at the same time a man who is undeserving of respect, and who has problems with his back passage…  — Max on explaining a few choice cuss words to Sir Lonli-Lokli.

Once I got used to the book’s particular sense of humor, I had quite a few laughs and was reminded a bit of Mike Resnick’s amusing John Justin Mallory tales. The comedic moments don’t always work though. One reason is because there’s just so much of it that some stuff like the banter and ongoing jokes start wearing thin. Another reason is that some of the jokes just flew over my head, partly because of the author’s Russian roots and partly because of the translation like a few expressions that I didn’t get at all: “I’ll step on the throat of any song.” “A vampire under your blanket.”

As for Max, I’m not sure I’ve ever read a first-person narrative that was so lacking in intimacy. For example, what kind of person was Max before he came to Echo? I mean, we’re told that he was a loser, that he hated his life, slept during the day instead of at night, and was a vivid dreamer, but you never really understand what kind of person Max was, nor how he adapted to life in Echo, and so on. Because of this lack of intimacy, it’s just really hard to connect with Max as our narrator, especially at the beginning of the book when readers are suddenly thrust into the world of Echo with little explanation as to how or why Max got there. Heck, the story of how Max came to Echo isn’t even related until 200 pages in, while certain personality traits like being addicted to cigarettes, being afraid of heights and being a neurotic are just casually thrown into the book at seemingly random points. Fortunately, what Max lacks in intimacy is more than made up by his strong supporting cast and the interesting things that constantly happen to him, like being able to perform incredible feats of magic — a lot of the times without him even knowing about it — possessing amazing luck and intuition that is very helpful with whatever case he’s working on, and his physiognomy undergoing strange changes such as turning into a vampire or acquiring the ability to kill a person with his spit.

Story-wise, The Stranger follows the exploits of Sir Max and the Minor Secret Investigative Force — here I kept thinking of Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson — and is divided into seven chapters, each of which focuses on a case and acts as a separate short story, but is connected overall. In “Debut in Echo,” readers are introduced to Max, Echo, Sir Juffin Hully, Sir Melifaro, Sir Lonli-Lokli, and Max’s very first case which involves murder and a haunted mirror. In “Juba Chebobargo and Other Nice Folks,” we meet the rest of the Minor Secret Investigative Force and follow Max on a case that somehow includes a haunted house, a string of unexplained robberies and dolls. In “Cell No. 5-OW-NOX,” Max travels with Sir Lonli-Lokli to the prison Xolomi to solve the mystery of a particular prison cell where prisoners keep dying. In The Stranger, Max must stop a murderer from our world who inadvertently traveled to Echo. In “King Banjee,” it’s nearly the end of the year and Max is handed a strange case of an innkeeper who was transformed into a giant piece of meat. In “Victims of Circumstance,” Max and Lady Melamori find themselves embroiled in a heartbreaking love quandary while solving the case of mind-control belts. Finally, in “Journey to Kettari,” Max is disguised as a woman and travels with Sir Lonli-Lokli to find out what happened to Sir Hully’s home city Kettari.

Max Frei’s The Stranger was a hard novel to get into, and it took a lot of patience and determination on my part to keep reading the book, but I’m very glad that I did so. Because once I got past the confusing beginning, was able to understand the structure of the novel, and became comfortable with The Stranger's various idiosyncrasies, I couldn’t put the book down. And now that I know what to expect, I can’t wait to return to Echo and read more of Max’s adventures! In the end, in spite of the book’s problems, I can easily see why The Labyrinths of Echo has enjoyed so much praise and success, and I strongly urge anyone who is a fan of imaginative fiction to give Max Frei’s The Stranger a try.
—Robert Thompson

The Stranger's Woes

ABOUT THE STRANGER’S WOES: The Stranger’s Woes continues the story of twenty-something loser Max Frei. A loafer who sleeps all day, Max one night finds himself transported to the magical world of Echo, where he possesses magical abilities and becomes the Nocturnal Representative of the Most Venerable Head of the Minor Secret Investigative Force of the City of Echo.

With his new friends and co-workers — the omniscient Sir Juffin Hully, the hilarious Melifaro and the beautiful Lady Melamori Blimm — Sir Max enjoys a life where he’s no longer a social outcast as he solves crimes, battles illegal magic and fights trespassing monsters from other worlds. Now, in The Stranger’s Woes, Max will encounter cases more complicated, extravagant and dangerous than ever before in this strange and topsy-turvy universe...

FORMAT/INFO: The Stranger’s Woes is 416 pages long divided over three titled chapters, with each chapter serving as a self-contained short story/novella that is interconnected with the series as whole. Narration is in the first-person exclusively via the protagonist Max. The Stranger’s Woes is the second book in The Labyrinths of Echo series, which consists of 10 volumes. In order to understand what is happening in The Stranger’s Woes, it is highly recommended that readers finish The Stranger before starting the second book.

June 9, 2011 marks the North American Hardcover publication of The Stranger’s Woes via The Overlook Press. The English edition is translated from Russian by Polly Gannon and Astamur Moore. The UK version will be published on June 30, 2011 via Gollancz.

ANALYSIS: It may have taken me a long while to become acclimated to the quirky humor, characters, setting, story structure and other idiosyncrasies found in Max Frei’s The Stranger, but once I did, the book was impossible to put down and I finished the novel immediately hungering for another helping of Sir Max’s adventures. For the most part, The Stranger’s Woes served up exactly what I was craving...

Comprised of three chapters/short stories, The Stranger’s Woes continues Max’s entertaining adventures as the Nocturnal Representative of the Most Venerable Head of the Minor Secret Investigative Force of the City of Echo. This time around, Max gets to deal with undead bandits, representatives from the empire of Arvarox who are seeking a dangerous fugitive, zombies who refuse to die, and becoming trapped on Earth. Max also gets to meet His Majesty King Gurig VIII for the first time; develops a new love interest in Tekki Shekk, the proprietor of a bar named after Max’s cats; is declared the king of Max’s supposed homeland in the Barren Lands; visits General Boboota Box’s home; serves as Sir Juffin Hully’s temporary replacement; develops new abilities (Lethal Spheres, tracking someone through their trace, traveling through the Doors between Worlds); makes some new acquaintances (Anday Pu, Rulen Bagdasys, Aloxto Allirox, Lieutenant Chekta Jax, Lady Kekki Tuotli); and introduces Echo to the marvelous invention that is movies.

Now because I was already familiar with the author’s writing style and the tone of the series that was established in the first book, I was able to pick up The Stranger’s Woes and start enjoying myself right from the get go. This familiarity was aided by how much the book shares with The Stranger, including the same humor and running jokes (Max’s laziness and voracious appetite), the same supporting cast (Sir Juffin Hully, Sir Shurf Lonli-Lokli, Sir Manga Melifaro, Sir Kofa Yox, Lady Melamori Blimm), the same imaginative world with its strange customs, the same story structure, and so on.

The downside to all of this is that The Stranger’s Woes doesn’t really offer anything different from its predecessor. In fact, you could take the three stories found in The Stranger’s Woes, insert them in The Stranger, and no one would be able to tell the difference. Sure, the cases are new, but characters and relationships remain largely static, and there aren’t any major overarching conflicts or subplots to help drive the story, apart from Max and Melamori’s love quandary and vague hints toward other complications. For now, this isn’t a major issue with eight more volumes to go, but at some point, The Labyrinths of Echo needs to do more than just have Sir Max solve crimes for the Minor Secret Investigative Force.

Other minor complaints include jokes that fail to translate properly or are painfully outdated — in Max’s world, VCRs are still the primary method for playing movies at home — and a first-person narrative that remains detached, although the third chapter/short story (“The Volunteers of Eternity”) does offer some interesting insight into Max’s life before Echo.

Aside from these issues, The Stranger’s Woes is another wildly imaginative and entertaining entry in The Labyrinths of Echo, which I enjoyed almost as much as I did the first book. However, I hope the story and characters are developed much further in the remaining sequels, otherwise, the series could get stale and repetitive very quickly... —Robert Thompson