Speculative Fiction Junkie

Reviews of works of science fiction, fantasy, horror, weird fiction, and related genres.

1/04/2009

Book I Couldn't Finish - The Stranger

Max Frei

I was pretty excited about The Stranger by Russian writer Max Frei. Apparently, his books have sold millions of copies in the rest of the world and the release of The Stranger in April will be the first time his work has been available in English.

The back-of-the-book blurb says the following: "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."

Sounds pretty cool, right? I thought so too. But I only made it to page 53 before reaching a point past which I could not force myself to continue. The problem, to oversimplify, is that the tale is lost in translation. First of all, I literally could not even understand what was happening, plotwise. Second, a lot of the dialog was extremely awkward, and completely precluded any possibility of properly enjoying the book. I hesitated to write this because I know this book is highly respected and I'm in no way saying that it's the translator's fault. I'm not assigning blame; all I'm saying is that I simply can't read this book in it's current state.

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6 comments:

A. P. said...

Hi, Plinydogg!
I'm a big fan of Max Frei myself, having read all of his books to date, and i'm sorry to hear that it has such a poor translation.
However, it was rather predictable, since a great deal of pleasure comes from hard-to-translate puns and some native russian jokes... (e.g. Конь в пальто :)
So, probably, all that's left is to wait until a better translation is done. Sometimes i consider writing a fan translation myself, but i fear that my English is not up to the task...

Anyway, thank you for trying the ;)

January 14, 2009 5:49 AM  
Plinydogg said...

A.P.,

Thanks for your comment. I knew that there were lot's of people who enjoyed Mr. Frei's books, which is one of the reasons why it was so disappointing that the translation wasn't very readable. I could tell that there were a lot of idioms that didn't quite translate (probably the native Russian jokes you refer to).

I just hope that the English version is majorly reworked before publication so that we English speakers can get in on the fun! It's obvious, from what little I read, that Mr. Frei has a great imagination.

January 14, 2009 7:20 AM  
The Mad Hatter said...

I recently read and reviewed The Stranger. I rarely put a book down so I pushed through to the end, but I was greatly disappointed. I too had high hopes but the translation just didn't work for me. I really like the Night Watch series and those were translated beautifully from russian so I wonder if it was the translators fault or if the style and humor just fall flat in English.

May 8, 2009 11:07 AM  
Plinydogg said...

I loved Nightwatch too but didn't care too much for the sequel...

Hats off to you for actually finishing this book!

May 8, 2009 11:28 AM  
The Mad Hatter said...

The most recent Night Watch book Last Watch is actually my favorite in the series now. It ties everything up. I'd put Day Watch as my least favorite.

June 11, 2009 9:34 AM  
Plinydogg said...

Good to know Mad Hatter. Perhaps I'll revisit this series in the future. Is Last Watch really better than Night Watch?!

June 11, 2009 10:06 AM  

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