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Falling for Icarus : A Journey Among the Cretans
On a windy spring morning in an ancient Cretan village, Rory MacLean fell to earth. His mother had died a few months earlier and a single obsession had risen from his grief: the notion to build a feather-light flying machine. And so, on the island where Daedalus and Icarus had made man’s maiden flight, MacLean journeyed back to beginnings, back into the Greek myths, and—with the help of his Cretan neighbors and plenty of wine—built a plane and tried to fly.
Falling for Icarus is at once a meditation on love, a celebration of the passion for flight, and a hilarious, vivid portrait of a village. Its generous and exhilarating characters restore MacLean’s faith in life. Through them, he tells a soaring, moving story about how a dream can transform sadness.
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First published January 1, 2004
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About the author
Rory MacLean
29 books66 followersCanadian Rory MacLean is one of Britain's most expressive and adventurous travel writers. His twelve books include the UK top tens Stalin's Nose and Under the Dragon as well as Berlin: Imagine a City, a book of the year and 'the most extraordinary work of history I've ever read' according to the Washington Post. He has won awards from the Canada Council and Arts Council of England and was nominated for the International IMPAC Dublin Literary prize. His works – according to the late John Fowles – are among those that 'marvellously explain why literature still lives'. A Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, he divides his time between the UK, Berlin and Toronto.
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
May 3, 2021
I found this book in a telephone box in the middle of the Essex countryside on a grey, windy and cold March cycle ride in the middle of a COVID lockdown.
The characters and the descriptions of the Cretan landscape took me to a different place, a place of warmth, sunshine and mountains. I wanted a story to escape my everyday monotony, and this book delivered.
The characters and the descriptions of the Cretan landscape took me to a different place, a place of warmth, sunshine and mountains. I wanted a story to escape my everyday monotony, and this book delivered.
March 16, 2014
One of the worst books I've ever had the misfortune to read. It deserves minus points.
The book is essentially the true story of a middle aged man who suffered a nervous breakdown due to the death of his mother.
After his mother died this man got the insane idea to give up everything he had back home and move (with his wife in tow) over to Cyprus where he would build a flying machine and fly it (I should point out he's not a qualified flight engineer or pilot) I felt very sorry for his wife and just felt strongly throughout the book that this man needs help.
The book itself is poorly written and boring. It couldn't hold my attention at all and is often confusing.
The book is essentially the true story of a middle aged man who suffered a nervous breakdown due to the death of his mother.
After his mother died this man got the insane idea to give up everything he had back home and move (with his wife in tow) over to Cyprus where he would build a flying machine and fly it (I should point out he's not a qualified flight engineer or pilot) I felt very sorry for his wife and just felt strongly throughout the book that this man needs help.
The book itself is poorly written and boring. It couldn't hold my attention at all and is often confusing.
September 30, 2025
Interestingly, when reading other reviews it seems this book is prone to appear to people unannounced instead of bought. So I found my copy, bound but missing its dustcover, in a little free library while on a walk in my lunchbreak.
Not having anything but its bright red jacket and title to go on, I brought it home not knowing what kind of book I was about to read. Whether it was fiction or non-fiction, contemporary or mythological, I would have to find out.
Having now finished this unexpected book, its premise is fascinating. Although I'm not sure how much of it can be considered fact or fiction - it being classified here on GoodReads as the latter, but its acknowledgements insinuating that a flight in Crete did take place - perhaps such a distinction isn't very relevant. However, I have to admit that I struggled a bit getting through it. Its prose is a little flowery but fine, but I had some difficulty relating to its characters. Many of the encountered inhabitants of Crete, though somewhere based in reality I'm sure, felt stereotypical and flat. And the same could essentially be said about the narrator and his wife, the latter being present very little except in name and occassional voice of concern. The motivation of the narrator is somewhat difficult to understand. Perhaps, when I reach a certain age I will be more able to relate to his struggle, both my parents fortunately still being alive. Everyone deals in grief in his own way, but overcoming it by moving overseas to build an aeroplane and flying it is an extraordinary measure, and makes for an interesting premise, but one that I feel the reader should be taken along with. Make me understand _why_ this feels necessary.
Apart from this, the book essentially balances two alternating stories. The building on the aeroplane on one hand, and the various encounters with people on the island and their respective stories on the other. And although these stories are often interesting, they have a very limited effect on the overall narrative, and characters often do not reappear. And the more often this happens, the more it feels like it slows the overall story down with irrelevant new characters. Of course, it can be said that this is the story of Crete and its people, and the aeroplane is second to that. But in that case, the stories do not carry enough weight.
Unfortunately, I have to conclude that despite its premise, this book wasn't entirely for me. Despite having enjoyed parts of it, overall I feel let down that I couldn't enjoy it more.
Not having anything but its bright red jacket and title to go on, I brought it home not knowing what kind of book I was about to read. Whether it was fiction or non-fiction, contemporary or mythological, I would have to find out.
Having now finished this unexpected book, its premise is fascinating. Although I'm not sure how much of it can be considered fact or fiction - it being classified here on GoodReads as the latter, but its acknowledgements insinuating that a flight in Crete did take place - perhaps such a distinction isn't very relevant. However, I have to admit that I struggled a bit getting through it. Its prose is a little flowery but fine, but I had some difficulty relating to its characters. Many of the encountered inhabitants of Crete, though somewhere based in reality I'm sure, felt stereotypical and flat. And the same could essentially be said about the narrator and his wife, the latter being present very little except in name and occassional voice of concern. The motivation of the narrator is somewhat difficult to understand. Perhaps, when I reach a certain age I will be more able to relate to his struggle, both my parents fortunately still being alive. Everyone deals in grief in his own way, but overcoming it by moving overseas to build an aeroplane and flying it is an extraordinary measure, and makes for an interesting premise, but one that I feel the reader should be taken along with. Make me understand _why_ this feels necessary.
Apart from this, the book essentially balances two alternating stories. The building on the aeroplane on one hand, and the various encounters with people on the island and their respective stories on the other. And although these stories are often interesting, they have a very limited effect on the overall narrative, and characters often do not reappear. And the more often this happens, the more it feels like it slows the overall story down with irrelevant new characters. Of course, it can be said that this is the story of Crete and its people, and the aeroplane is second to that. But in that case, the stories do not carry enough weight.
Unfortunately, I have to conclude that despite its premise, this book wasn't entirely for me. Despite having enjoyed parts of it, overall I feel let down that I couldn't enjoy it more.
February 16, 2021
Wonderful, uplifting and warmly human tale of a man’s desire to overcome seemingly impossible obstacles - and fly. Added to which his live of Crete and its people shines through like the sun.
May 6, 2013
His bemused enjoyment of the eccentricity of Cretan village life and Cretans is what gives this book its particular warmth. Everything is a drama, larger-than-life in a curious mixture of the practical and dreamlike. Time is relative, wealth more than money, emotion more important than cold logic. I had worried that in my novel 'Love, Freedom or Death', set on WW2 Crete that I'd overdone the recklessness (which I have to the extent that things move too quickly to allow for savouring the everyday details - it was wartime, after all!) but reading this reassures me. Rory MacLean provides an opportunity to relish a world that is already being smothered by 'progress'.
November 18, 2014
I loved the writing in places, but the portraits of the people in the Greek village were more interesting to me than the building of an aeroplane - I somehow never connected enough to feel strongly about his quest, particularly towards the end. Another annoyance was that his wife remained pretty much a blank, even though she was at his side throughout the story. It's clearly a very personal story to do with the death of his mother and yet he doesn't delve deeply enough into that part. But beautiful writing about Crete saves the day.
July 20, 2008
A beautifully-written book tracing one man’s catharsis as he comes to terms with the loss of his mother by building a flying machine, assisted and occasionally hindered by the richly drawn characters from the village in which Rory and his wife spent those few months in Crete. A Real story about real people, laced with humour and revelations about Cretan village life.
April 18, 2013
Really quite an easy and enjoyable book about loss, life, friendship, flight and great Greek characters
May 3, 2017
This is a FANTASTIC book. I read it in preparation for going to Crete in a few weeks. The lyrical, somewhat surreal prose is reminiscent of Umberto Eco. I love the story and the physical and emotional journey of the narrator/author. I'm not so sure how much of it was made up and how much of it was real, but, as the book states, that doesn't matter if the story is good.
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews