The Reviews

From Booklist, 05/15/96

Love Story meets The Bridges of Madison County in this slim first novel. When she learns that she has six months to live, 37-year-old India Blake makes a list of things to do before she dies, among them to fly a falcon. She tracks down falconer Rhodri MacNeal in his cabin in the hills, and when their eyes meet, their lives are changed. No-nonsense India, who nursed her mother through her fatal cancer, knows what to expect of the rest of her life and feels little responsibility to her marriage to philandering Dougie (although she acknowledges that he's good beside sickbeds). So India does all the things on her list with Rhodri (and finds passion to boot), then goes home to Dougie to die. The lovers' declarations of their feelings are sometimes annoyingly pretentious, and the uplifting ending may not suit all tastes; still, the pace is brisk, with brief chapters shifting from past to present, and the parts with the birds are good. A tearjerker with light at the end of the tunnel. Michele Leber
Copyright© 1996, American Library Association. All rights reserved

From Le Monde, Vendredi 4 Juillet 1997, Littératures, V

Le Crépuscule de L'Amour, d'Elaine Clark McCarthy Les analyses sont formelles, elle n'en a plus que pour trois mois. Au soir d'une vie qu'elle trouve trop vide, la condamnée dresse la liste des choses à faire avant de disparaître. Voir voler des faucons y figure. S'éprendre du fauconnier, vivre avec lui une semaine de bonheur avant l'hôpital n'était pas prévu. Elle saisit l'occasion et savoure chaque insant sans rien dissimuler. L'auteur a su éviter les pièges de son sujet; au lieu d'une bluette larmoyante, elle a écrit un livre calme et serein. L'amour est plus fort que la mort, ça fait bien longtemps qu'on vous le dit (traduit de l'anglais (Etats-Unis) par Danièle Lormont, Calman-Levy, 165 p., 85 F).

English Translation: The verdict is in; she has no more than three months left. In the evening of a life that she has found completely empty, the condemned woman prepares a list of things to do before she disappears. To see the flight of falcons figures there. She finds a falconer, lives with him for one week of happiness before the hospital becomes inevitable. She learns to seize the moment and savor each instant without any disguise. The author has avoided the pitfalls of her subject. Instead of a tearjerker she has written a book calm and serene. Love is stronger than death; they've been saying so for a long time.

From FISAC (an Italian on-line newspaper)

di Elaine Clark McCarthy, Mondadori Editore India Blake - giovane californiana - rivive il diario degli ultimi mesi allorchè, come istantanee mentali, le ritornano alla mente tutti gli attimi più salienti che hanno caratterizzato la sua breve esistenza. La scoperta di avere un tumore che non le lascerà scampo la spinge a rielaborare le scelte fatte e quelle solo auspicate e le fornisce un surplus di energia che la donna direzionerà alla ricerca frenetica di dare spazio finalmente ai sogni irrealizzati.

L'aver vissuto per anni confinata in casa per accudire la madre, anch'ella malata di cancro, un matrimonio con un coetaneo, fallito molto presto per incomunicabilità reciproche, un desiderio di fuga e di rinascita che cova ancora sotto le ceneri della sua anima, la spinge a compilare una lista di azioni, da sempre accantonate ed ora divenute impellenti in vista dell'imminente fine. Un giro in mongolfiera, vedere l'oceano, la discesa di un fiume in gommone, il reperimento di un geode di quarzo e, più importante di tutti, il desiderio di vedere volare i falchi nelle aurore montane autunnali: questi i sogni innocenti che India si trascina dal passato intessuto di privazioni.

Sarà proprio Rhodri, l'abile falconiere, colui che le permetterà di esaudire il sogno più grande e con cui inizierà una struggente storia d'amore, intessuta di passione e comunione spirituale, culminanti nel volo finale che le anime di entrambi riusciranno a intrecciare.

From Publishing News, April 12th, 1999
Tim Manderson's special selection

Like all the best classic love stories, The Falconer contains tragedy as well as true happiness. India Blake, age 37, lives in a small town in America with her husband, Dougie, who cannot resist philandering. India learns that she has inoperable cancer, having only recently watched her mother die of it, and in the short time left to her makes a list of all the things she most wants to do, including watching a hawk swoop. As a result she meets Rhodri MacNeal, a Scottish-trained falconer who lives nearby in a shack with his beloved falcons. He is a pilot from the Vietnam war and now a crop sprayer. They fall in love and have a passionate but brief affair. I wondered how on earth this short novel could end without a feeling of anti-climax, but the author brilliantly and imaginatively has written the perfect ending. It is a small gem of a novel, with the fire and passion of a diamond and perfectly crafted. There is, too, that vital bit of magic in the writing which prevents it ever becoming over-sentimental of mawkish. I gather Fox have bought the film rights. This is indeed a truly remarkable first novel.

From Writer's Connection Newsletter Industry News, May, 1996

THE FALCONER is a compelling story of a 37-year old woman with inoperable cancer who finds love with a falconer, along with answers to the "whys, hows, and what-ifs that have shaped her life." The boOk was reviewed in Publisher's Weekly in advance of its publication by Random House in May. The reviewer wrote, "Those who enjoy stories about the discovery of belief, about finding meaning at the end, will surely gulp down sobs by the time this slender tale delivers its final coup de grace and releases India [the heroine] to fly at last." The book's talented author, Elaine Clark McCarthy, attended last year's Selling to Hollywood Conference and told some of us then that the book was being characterized as a Bridges of Madison County type novel set in the Sierra Nevada. Before the book was sold to a publisher, Twentieth Century Fox bought the film rights for Deborah Schindler's production company (producer of "Waiting to Exhale").

From Romantic Times Magazine, June, 1996

In a stunning debut novel, author Elaine Clark McCarthy delivers an unforgettable story of a woman facing her own imminent mortality. India Blake Davern, 37 years old and living in the same small town all her life, is in a marriage that long ago withered. Even her husband's affairs no longer trouble her. Her doctor's diagnosis, however, shakes her to her very core. Like her mother before her, India is dying of cancer, and her life expectancy is estimated at several months at best. Without telling her friends or husband, India makes lists of what she wants to do before she dies. At the top of the list is learning how to handle a falcon. Having heard of a man who trains falcons locally, India tracks Rhodri MacNeal to his remote home. From the moment they meet, India and Rhodri sense they are meant for each other; in his she can confide her deepest dreams and fears. Knowing that their time together is brief makes it all the more precious. Can Rhodri help India learn not to fear death, but to accept and embrace its freedom? This extraordinary and unusual novel is both emotionally intense and riveting. Ms. Clark McCarthy chooses to tell the story in both first and third person, plus alternating between past and present. Despite its somber storyline, this novel is uplifting rather than depressing. Quite a read! May, 146 pp. $17.00)

Jill M. Smith

From The Palm Beach Post Sunday, July 28,1996

The day she learns that she has cancer, 37-year-old India Davern makes a list. A keen, honest, hopeful list of all that she still wants to experience. Among the poetic and the possible ("balloon ride; river raft; find a thunder egg"), one dream becomes the most important beacon of all: "fly a falcon."

It is this desire not to postpone dreams anymore that leads India to the greatest discovery of all: Perhaps it is never too late to love.

By page six of The Falconer, Elaine Clark McCarthy has thrown down the gauntlet and set up the challenge that will occupy the rest of the book: Will India live long enough to know what it is like to truly love someone and be loved? Does illness destroy the capacities of the heart as easily as it destroys the body? Without offering either a simple answer or a grand finale, McCarthy's novel explores the dance between choice and kismet, and the opportunities we have to change our lives for the better.

Since her marriage to perennially unfaithful Dougie, India's life has been a symphony of loneliness and passivity. When she crosses paths with the local falconer, a soft-spoken, sensitive Celt named Rhodri MacNeal, she suddenly realizes the companionship she has been missing. Despite the difficulties, both Rhodri (pronounced Rory) and India are reborn with the hope that they have finally discovered their soulmate.

Each chapter of The Falconer is a series of flashbacks that alternate with India's narrative as she lays dying at the hospital. This hopscotch from past to present and back again only brings a sharper tension to the underlying question: Where is Rhodri now? As McCarthy gradually reveals that stunning answer and the mutual discovery of love between India and Rhodri, she also exposes one central irony; they have everything they need except time. "We combed our pasts, searching for ways we might have met before .. What if our cars had both broken down in Kansas City, where our paths would cross, and we'd gone for repairs to the same garage on the same day?"

Ultimately, it is not the randomness of the distance between their lives that rankles so, but India's sense of regret at not leaving her marriage years ago. For if The Falconer is a novel about late-blooming love, it is also about the grappling each individual must do with a sense of lost time. Yet as Rhodri teaches her how to fly the falcons in the time they have left, India is learning something more profound -- how to let her soul fly free again. In Rhodri's gentle presence, her crushed esteem flowers into self-acceptance and a natural joy. Their time together becomes a healing balm for her to accept her past, her journey of living with illness and ultimately, the letting go. He explains, "I think we leap from our discarded bodies like a falcon off the fist, spread our new wings and just take off."

If there is any disappointment in Falconer, it is McCarthy's reliance on the paradigm of medieval courtly love, where true love is never found within a marriage, only outside it. However, McCarthy's writing is strong enough to go beyond such devices, although it would have been interesting to see McCarthy wrangle with the enigma of married love as much as the dazzle of the affair. The relationship between India and her husband Dougie could have been explored for all the hidden love it did contain, but instead it falls to the side into the Death Valley of cliches.

Yet for all such small regrets, The Falconer provides a glimpse into the heart that is both profound and sentimental. With the falcon itself as an Egyptian symbol of immortality, as well as a medieval mark of royalty, McCarthy offers the reader a starkly beautiful tale of love and renewal.

Blending disappointment and hope into an epiphany of love, The Falconer shows us the astounding power of the heart to reach into eternity.

Lisa McDonough

From San Jose Mercury News Book Section, June 2, 1996

No Sweat! Recreational reading ahead The idea that "summer reading" is a particular kind of reading is nonsense, of course. It supposes that in the steamy leisure of August we look for something light, exciting and not too demanding, as opposed to -- what? The Dostoyevsky and academic poetry we plowed through in February?

No, the truth is that Americans read the same stuff during the summer that they would the rest of the year, if they read anything at all then. For all to many, summer is the only window of opportunity for recreational reading; you get no points for material stapled in the upper left-hand corner or anything that requires a response by Tuesday.

Now that we've agreed on what it is you're escaping from, what is out there to escape to? Just like California's weather, it's unseasonal out there. To begin with, there is a serious paucity o trash fiction. This doesn't mean you won't be able to find any, but there isn't the toxic waste spill of recent years.

There's also the intriguing background of The Falconer (Random house, 134 pp., $14.95), a first novel by Elaine Clark McCarthy. It's a slender, intense and highly erotic tale of a woman who is taught the art of falconry.

From Swansea South Wales Evening Post

The trend was set by The Bridges of Madison County. Robert James Waller wrote the tale of hot passion amidst the most plain of circumstances.

It was a smash hit and Clint Eastwood was happy to star alongside Meryl Streep in the film version. Then came The Horse Whisperer, another tale of uplifting love for the unsuspecting now riding high in the bestseller lists.

Now we have this splendid effort all the way from California's Ms. McCarthy. The film rights have already been sold to Twentieth Century Fox and Sean Connery has been pencilled in to play the lead role of Vietnam vet Rhodri MacNeal.

MacNeal has found solace in his falcons. He finds passion in the form of India Blake, a woman trapped in a desperate marriage and on cancer's death row. The question is: How can they come to terms with finding true love ... but finding it so late?

From The Bookseller 3 January 1997 Paperback Preview ‘97
Under "Ones to Watch,"

Elaine Clark McCarthy, The Falconer (Arrow)

A truly schmaltzy love story about a 37 year old dying woman finding passionate romance. Short, sharp and devastating--Love Story with feathers.

From Library Journal April 15, 1996

When India Blake is given only a short time to live, she begins to realize what she has missed in life. Wanting to try things she has never done before, she decides on impulse to learn to fly falcons. This fateful decision leads her to Rhodri, a master falconer. It also takes her on a voyage of self-discovery. She finds a passion she has never known, and in death she finds the completeness and freedom she never found in life. This slim first novel tugs powerfully on the emotions, evoking both regret for opportunities lost and hope for dreams fulfilled. The writing is both spare and lyrical, adding to the intensity of the short time India and Rhodri have together. Not a traditional romance, this should nevertheless appeal to those who enjoy reading about emotional relationships.

The Falconer placed 7th on Library Journal's prepublication bestseller list published on May 15, 1996.

From Publishers Weekly March 11, 1996

The story of a passionate but doomed love affair related by a 37-year-old woman who has inoperable cancer, McCarthy's debut transcends the genre of pulp romance fiction through her poetic use of metaphor. Even so, it's a calculated weeper, heavy with emotional downers and melodramatic contrivances. Purposefully forming a list of things to do before she dies, India Blake makes certain to include only those goals still attainable -- like a ride in a balloon or seeing the ocean -- with an emphasis on the natural world. It seems unlikely that her philandering husband, Dougie, will either help or hinder the fulfillment of these modest aspirations, since -- from India's perspective -- he's just waiting for her to die so that he can see his latest girlfriend openly. In fact, perspective plays a big part in this tale set in the Sierra Nevadas, with India acquiring much of hers through her all-too-brief relationship with Rhodri MacNeal, a falconer. India's life has been hard; she nursed her own alcoholic mother through a losing battle with cancer. Not only does Rhodri teach her how to fly falcons, but he also gives her the chance to be the little girl she never was. Ultimately, Rhodri helps India find her answers to the whys, hows and what-ifs that have shaped her life and, finally, to the Big Question: What does it all mean? The narrative is hampered by abrupt changes between narrator India's "I must-keep-my-chin-up" first-person mode and a curiously flat third-person overview. Yet those who enjoy stories about the discovery of belief, about finding meaning at the end, will surly gulp down sobs by this time this slender tale delivers its final coup de grâce and releases India to fly at last.

From Register-Pajaronian May 22, 1997

The Falconer is a commendable debut novel by local author and poet Elaine Clark McCarthy. The novel beings with the first meeting of the main characters, India Blake and Rhodri MacNeal, a Scottish highlander, ruggedly handsome and a loner who has never married. Rhodri is a pilot by profession; he flies planes fighting fires for the Forest Service. In his spare time he is a falconer. Up to the time he meets India, his only passion is flying hawks.

India has led a miserable and unfulfilling life in her Sierra hometown. In her early adulthood, India was bitterly denied her life's dream of escaping her alcoholic mother as a result of having to take care of her mother during her five-year bout with cancer. "The scholarships were all arranged; she was nearly free. But as she stepped toward the brink, her mother found one final claim. Cancer, the ace of trumps."

At the end of her mother's illness, India had little to which to look forward until her childhood heart throb returned to town. The local librarian, Jean Jones, is India's best friend. Upon hearing about the marriage proposal, Jean believed that India's life would change and that India would be happy. But Jean's assessment of the situation changed soon after when she heard of the husband's infidelity and advised India to "get out while you can." Despite the advice, India remained married to the charming and boyish Dougie, although she did not love him. She tolerated his affairs by learning the rituals and lore of the local native people.

And so now we find India, like her mother before her, diagnosed with cancer. She keeps her illness a secret and begins writing a list of all the things she would like to do before she dies. The list includes "Fly a falcon." She seeks out the falconer, Rhodri MacNeal, and upon meeting him their lives change immediately. As the story goes, Rhodri teaches India about falconry and about letting passion fly freely.

One of the greatest strengths of the book is the characterization of Rhodri as the falconer and the depth of his belief in their love. When India asks him about his vision of the hereafter, he tells her, "I'll fly with you. That's all I want."

Others have found "The Falconer" to be unmoving and cliche. But for me, it is short and sweet as a first novel. It is best read in one sitting to absorb the beauty of the poetic praise and to appreciate the intensity of the characters' feeling for one another. It is a book about fate, passion, love, regret and dying. "The Falconer" is great for a relaxing spring or summer day out on the patio or in the recliner. And if you are like me, be sure to keep a handkerchief nearby; and be prepared to weep for the love that is India's and Rhodri's.

Deborah Barrow