The Stalker Case of Max Fanheart (novel)

The Stalker Case of Max Fanheart is a novel by Pandora Banister. The story follows protagonist Max Fanheart as she tries to escape from an obsessive stalker. Inspiration came from a Creepypasta, as well as several stalker documentaries.

Plot Synopsis
The story opens with Mackenzie “Max” Fanheart as she is confronted by an obsessive stalker, Darius. While trying to escape, she falls and knocks herself unconscious. Darius then abducts her and, after binding her to a chair, explains his plans of turning her into a doll. She is able to convince him otherwise, and afterward manages to knock him down and escape in the back of a truck.

The truck arrives in the town of Marshall, and she makes her way into an auditorium, where the class of Kumar’s Therapeutic Boarding School is constructing props for a musicale production. Paranoid because of her head injury, she hides up on a catwalk and waits for them to leave. Upon trying to climb down, she falls through one of the panels, where she is discovered by students Christopher “Chris” Fowler and Savannah Norse.

They take her to the hospital, where she explains her situation to them. As the three become friends, Savannah allows Max to call her parents on her phone. Two police officers come to question Max about her predicament.

After Max’s parents pick her up and take her home, Chris and Savannah head back to the school. Early the next morning, Chris is awakened by the doorbell and finds a delirious Max, her red hair having prematurely aged to white.

As it turns out, the police caught Darius, but he managed to convince them of his false innocence by using Max’s head injury against her and manipulating the crime scene in his favor. He manages to convince Max’s father as well, which angers Max. Later that night, she finds her parents murdered by Darius so “she won’t have anyone to hide behind”. He pursues her again, but she manages to lose him. She travels to her best friend Greta Watkins’ house, who agrees to drive her to Kumar’s.

The principal, Morris Kumar, questions her about her predicament; upon finding out her parents were murdered and she plans to hide in the school, he agrees to hire her as a housekeeper. Chris and Savannah lead her around the school and introduce her to the other students.

That night during a thunderstorm, Max joins Izzy, Sarah, Hillary, Margie, Savannah, and Millie for a movie marathon. After they fall asleep, she decides to return to her room. However, she is confronted by Darius, who reveals he found her location by putting a tracker on her phone (which she retrieved when going to get a few things from her house). He starts sexually harassing her, but is stopped from kidnapping her by Karter, who chases him off with a baseball bat.

After being returned to her room, she reveals to Izzy that she plans to leave and find a new place to hide. Izzy, believing the school to be safer, tries to convince her otherwise, but Max believes that Morris will kick her out. Morris appears and says she can stay until Darius is caught, then leaves with the students to continue working on the props. After Max finishes her housekeeping duties, Izzy dyes her now-white hair blue.

The next day, she finds a message from Darius spray-painted on the back wall of the school. In order to take her mind off of it, Morris allows Max to accompany them to the auditorium. There, she reunites with Greta, who is revealed to have a crush on Kash. After the students finish with construction for the day, Max and Greta (who both share a dream of becoming Broadway performers) stay behind to test out a visuals contraption Kash built. While Max is performing, Kash and Nate return to give them the keys to lock up; there, Nate falls in love with Max after seeing how happy performing makes her.

Once they return to the school, Max helps Izzy wash her car (which was egged while she was buying materials for costumes). While they play with the hose, they are confronted by Darius, now brandishing a silenced gun. While attempting to kidnap Max, Izzy tries to intervene but is easily incapacitated. However, Maxwell intervenes as well and the rest of the students manage to save Max and Izzy, but not before Darius escapes.

Now depressed over the fact that Darius will kill anyone to get to her, Max claims guilt over the whole ordeal. However, Amber manages to talk her out of it, comparing her situation to male patriarchy and rape culture. The next day, Greta takes Max on a shopping trip to cheer her up.

After a few days, opening night of the production arrives. As everyone is preparing, Morris reveals that a performer (whose performance is considered the best finisher) cannot come due to family matters. Felix suggests that Max can fill in, and she promptly agrees. The production goes off without a hitch, with many people amazed by the visuals. Once they get the Max's performance, everyone is amazed by her singing ability.

The next day (Halloween), everyone heads off to the Halloween Carnival, where Nate reveals his feelings to Max. Flattered, Max states how starting a relationship wouldn't be a good idea, due to Darius' intense jealousy. Around the same time, Kash (at the insistence of Sarah) confesses his own feelings to Greta, who runs off in a panic. Thinking this is due to her thinking he's pathetic, Kash runs off in shame. After he leaves, Sarah is confronted by her emotionally abusive mother, but it stopped by a man named "Adam". Though he presents as a kindly young man, Sarah becomes put off by him after he asks her to help him get his phone from his locked car. After denying him, he eventually threatens her with a gun, revealing himself to be Darius.

After a while, Max decides to head back to the school. Chris drives her there, needing to get more money for games and rides. However, he is incapacitated by Darius, who shoots him in the shoulder. After some struggle, he successfully kidnaps Max. Chris' unconscious and heavily beaten body is discovered by a small trick-or-treater.

Darius takes Max to an isolated lake house, where he strips her down and locks her in a closet. He eventually reveals his plan to "make her realize her feelings for him" by brutally torturing her via branding. Though resistant at first, Max eventually gives in after four days and submissively puts up with his demands.

Meanwhile, Nate, Chris, and Kash start their own investigation. After Greta tells them of an old family lake house that Darius' sister told her about, they deduce that Darius must've taken Max there. Arriving there to rescue her, they gain the assistance of a local man, who agrees to have them hide in his home if something happens. After confirming that this is the place, Kash and Chris distract Darius while Nate searches for (and finds) Max. However, she refuses to leave out of fear that he will hurt more people in order to get to her.

While trying to convince her to leave, Nate is incapacitated by Darius, who drags him down to the basement to kill him. Locking him in the same closet that Max had been detained in, Darius realizes Nate's love for Max and, after taunting him with details of Max's torture, prepares to kill him. However, he is stopped by Max, who entices him with the promise of sex. As they are about to become intimate, Max stabs him with a knife (which she'd grabbed from the kitchen while Darius was busy with Nate) and knocks him off the bed. After making sure he's unconscious, she dresses herself and releases Nate from his bonds.

In an epilogue, it's revealed that Darius died from blood loss before the police could arrive; after listening to Max's statement, they rule his death as self-defense. Some time after, Max moves in with Greta and the two begin working for their Broadway auditions (as well as starting relationships with Nate and Kash). They eventually gain enough money to move to New York and start working up experience. After a day of working on a student film, Max stares out her window at the New York night life and expresses her faith in their acting careers.

Characters
Mackenzie Fanheart

Darius Anderson

Nathan Kemp

Christopher Fowler

Kash Smith

Greta Watkins

Savannah Norse

Morris Kumar

Isabelle Maye

Sarah Martins

Louie Karver

Maxwell Oxford

Karter Irvine

Harry Yates

Cecelia Lane

Samantha Oake

Cynthia Neil

Tommy Harrison

Margie Kennedy

Felix King

Patience Parker

Hillary Sanderson

Millie Tate

Garrett Thomason

Amber Oliva

Trivia

 * The novel was originally going to focus on Max being targeted by Creepypasta Jason the Toymaker . However, Krisantyl (Jason's creator) refused to give permission to use the character (for obvious reasons), so Jason was replaced with Darius.
 * Max's original love interest was going to be Chris, but was later changed to Nate.
 * Kash was originally going to be in love with Savannah, but would later come to fall in love with Greta. This was later changed to him already being in love with Greta.
 * The novel makes two references to changed ideas from the Disney film, Frozen :
 * Sometime after Max's hair is dyed blue, she performs the song Let it Go. Elsa's hair color was originally going to be blue (this is referenced by Nate).
 * In the epilogue, Max and Greta perform First Time in Forever at a child's birthday party (Max as Elsa, Greta as Anna). Anna's name was originally going to be Greta, referencing the character Gerda from the story The Snow Queen, the Hans Christian Anderson story the film is based on.


 * The fake name Darius uses when abducting Sarah, Adam, could reference the horror film Saw, Max's favorite horror film franchise.
 * If you spell Adam backwards (Mada), it's made up of the first two initials in Max's and Darius' names.


 * The method of torture that Darius uses (carving in Max's skin with a heated needle) was inspired by several sequences from House of 1000 Corpses, in which several female corpses are shown with words and shapes carved into their flesh.
 * The scene also bears resemblance to a similar sequence from The Girl Next Door by Jack Ketchum, in which the main girl is strapped down to a bed and has a phrase carved into her skin with a heated bobby pin.


 * Max was originally going to keep her white hair and her Halloween costume was going to be Shiro from the anime Deadman Wonderland . However, it was deemed too inappropriate to wear in public (especially in such a situation) and was pulped.
 * Her hair color was changed to being dyed periwinkle with a pink ombre and her costume was going to be White Rock Shooter from Black Rock Shooter: The Game . However, this costume was also deemed too inappropriate.
 * Her hair color was changed to a mix of various shades of blue and her costume was changed to Death Scythe . However, the costume was considered too plain compared to the others and was changed to Geshumaru.


 * Although not mentioned in the book, the following characters are enrolled at Kumar's for the following disorders:
 * Louie has REM Sleep Disorder.
 * Samantha has Depression.
 * Patience has Separation Anxiety (this is referenced by her constantly texting her parents.
 * Chris has Avoidant Personality Disorder.
 * And Hillary has ADD.
 * Amber was originally going to be a student with ADHD like Izzy, but was changed to be a part of the staff.


 * Several characters share first and surnames with characters from the Saw franchise:
 * Sarah with Sarah Blalok from the video game, Saw II: Flesh and Blood.
 * Chris with Chris from Saw III.
 * Millie Tate with Obi Tate from Saw II.
 * Greta Watkins with Ray Watkins from Saw: The Video Game.
 * And Laura with Laura Hunter from Saw II.


 * When Max questions Darius about how he got into her house in the beginning of the novel, he says that the door was unlocked, which leads Max's mother to believe she forgot to lock the door, but Max believes he picked the lock. However, Darius is never shown picking locks throughout the novel; he got into the school by an open window and by forcing Sarah to let him in. The author has confirmed that the door was indeed left unlocked by accident, which is based off of something the author's mother did a few times in real life (thankfully, no burglars or creeps have taken advantage of this).
 * Many of the characters' physical descriptions aren't given so as to allow readers to come up with what they think the characters look like.
 * Two characters in the novel make reference (in some ways) to the Mad Max franchise: Maxwell Oxford and Savannah Norse. Maxwell is nicknamed "Mad Max" behind his back, while Savannah's name is similar to that of the character, Savannah Nix . It should be worth mentioning that both Maxwell and Savannah suffer from anger issues, possibly to make the characters connected in some way.
 * In another possible reference, Savannah suggests giving Max the nickname "May". Though she explains the nickname comes from the film MAY, it could also reference the minor character May Swaisey from the original Mad Max.


 * The original plan for the scene where Max gives up only featured her hearing the voice convincing her to give up. Considering the idea too confusing, it was changed to Max hallucinating a mutilated vision of herself convincing her to give up.