“The Falcon”

By James P. Hogan
Apex Science Fiction & Horror Digest
Volume 1: Issue 2, Summer 2005
Reviewed by Max Jahr

James P. Hogan’s recent novelette, “The Falcon, ” tells the stories of two women separated by time, yet with strangely shared memories. The first focuses on Myriam, who lives in a repressive statist society. She’s arrested when she refuses to fire missiles at so-called enemies in a distant town. She has revised her thinking about the role of the individual and the state; one of Myriam’s hidden books turns out to be Rose Wilder Lane’s The Discovery of Freedom.

The second tale is more diffuse, about a young woman, Vanessa, recovering from some sort of illness, prone to bad dreams, but with a bright future. Both women feel somewhat lost in their surroundings, and little is resolved at the conclusion of Hogan’s story. Yet the tone conveyed is quite powerful (especially the scenes with Myriam), and makes for an enjoyable work of short fiction.