Rating: 
Summary: Mia Farrow eloquently describes a painful and joyful life.
Review: In "What Falls Away," Mia Farrow describes a life that many would think charmed but that was often a true nightmare. In the book, Farrow chronicles many extremely painful and heart-wrenching experiences but writes so beautifully that the reader can't help but turn the page. As for Farrow's infamous case against Woody Allen, anyone who reads this book will know that Farrow is a true hero for adopting 14 children, and Woody Allen is a cowardly, sick man who deserves no respect. This book is incredible! I would recommend it to anyone and have recommended it to everyone.
Rating:
Summary: Mia Farrow eloquently describes a painful and joyful life.
Review: In "What Falls Away," Mia Farrow describes a life that many would think charmed but that was often a true nightmare. In the book, Farrow chronicles many extremely painful and heart-wrenching experiences but writes so beautifully that the reader can't help but turn the page. As for Farrow's infamous case against Woody Allen, anyone who reads this book will know that Farrow is a true hero for adopting 14 children, and Woody Allen is a cowardly, sick man who deserves no respect. This book is incredible! I would recommend it to anyone and have recommended it to everyone.
Rating:
Summary: Heartbreaking and inspirational..
Review: Mia Farrow has been someone I have always watched from afar. I knew vaguely about her problems with Woody Allen and I was aware of her large of family of children, being the adoptive mother of six myself, and the mother of three natural born children. So..I was curious to read her book. I think any mother reading this book will understand Mia and her basic instinct to keep her family intact no matter what. Her compassion for her family that said to her that just because someone does something wrong doesn't mean we turn our backs on them. She tried all the right steps in order to "fix" the situation with Woody and her children. In this book we hear the anguish of a mother, the unconditional love of a mother...the words of a human being who believes in committment. Any mother who has been in a relationship with an abusive man will identify with this book and find strength from it. Mia had the added hardship of living in the public eye..all her dirty laundry became public domain. I think every reader will agree that she didn't deserve it..and will find inspiration in a woman who shared her good luck, who returned what she had been given, with children who otherwise might not even be alive today.
Rating:
Summary: Touching and beautiful. Not soon forgotten.
Review: Mia Farrow's life has been full of challenges, children, and celebrities, yet she has come through it all as open, caring, and strong as she could possibly be. If you want to read her account of the whole Woody Allen / Soon-Yi / Dylan Farrow affair, read this book. If you have ever seen any of the movies she or either of her parents have been in, read this book. If you have children, read this book. If you find any joy in life, read this book to reaffirm that there are a few simply magnificent and good people in this world.
Rating: 
Summary: interesting
Review: Mia herself comes across as a bit quirky, but nothing worse. This is definitely a revenge book on Woody Allen... The pithiest line about Allen in the book is by Maureen Stapelton, "He isn't shy. He's antisocial." Allen does come across as possibly sociopathic. Franky, I'm a Beatles freak, and got the book just to read the chapter about Mia's experience meditating with the Beatles at the retreat in Rishikesh, India. She enjoyed their company, and that chapter was great fun to read, and I recommend reading it to any Beatles fan.
Rating: 
Summary: Dull only when Mia tries to be beatific
Review: Mia is at her most interesting when she recounts her exceptionally celebrity-soaked past, for it's on time further back that she seems to be able to tell without "spinning," the way she does her present. It's when she gets to the more recent times, particularly the despicable Woody Allen's predation on her adopted daughter, that she tries to be lofty and ends up sounding trite. She makes sure we know what she thinks of Woody Allen's life on the analyst's couch (a weakness--one to which she does not in her entire life succumb until the woody-soon yi debacle). She sounds like she could use a few years of therapy herself, to gain some insight into herself--why she took so long to break up with Woody, why she feels compelled to undertake adoption after adoption of handicapped children; how similar a situation she got in to with Frank Sinatra as Soon Yi did with Woody; how Soon Yi's behavior is understandable when you realize she was completely abandoned in a big city, Seoul at age 5 (or 7--no one knows for sure where she came from or when she was born), only to end up in Ms. Farrow's small private orphanage. Come one, Mia! Punch the pillow! Give it to him! He seduced your DAUGHTER! You will be forgiven for being angry about that!
Rating:
Summary: Fascinating memoir of a fascinating life
Review: Mia leaves her soul bare in this retelling of her brief life, it reads as if she were always the same age, having had to grow up quickly in large Hollywood family, coping with her parents' fame, her father's womanizing and his sudden death. As for her remembrances of her marriages to Sinatra and composer Andre Previn, she is gentle and appears to have no ill will; she lets the reader know each man will always have a piece of her, and that must make Sinatra's death all the more painful to her.The chapters regarding her life with Woody Allen are not for the squeamish -- Mia writes frankly of Woody's disregard for her children (including the son they shared) and his unnatural relationships with daughters Dylan and Soon-Yi. Any instance of child abuse, regardless of whether or not the abuser is a celebrity, is enough to make me sick, and despite what I think of Woody Allen since reading this book, a part of me still wonders why it took so long for Mia to finally discover what was happening to her children. Read What Falls Away and decide for yourself if you want to see another Woody Allen film again.
Rating:
Summary: Interesting and informative
Review: Mia's account of her relationship with Woody Allen is quite revealing. She speaks casually of his "eccentricities" yet she should have backed away from that man, not walked away, for it is obvious that his problems are quite serious. There is a reason that man has spent his adult life in therapy. He is much more suited to Soon Yi than Mia Farrow. It appears that Soon Yi and Woody have more in common. No loyalty and deceipt versus the kindness of Mia. Ever since the break up between Woody and Mia, I have not watched one Woody Allen movie and nor would I again. The sad part is that Woody Allen still doesn't get it. He does not recognize the bonds he has violated.
Rating:
Summary: A wonderful book written by a child woman
Review: Mia's story is fascinating. She seems so innocent and naive throughout her life and times with the men in her life. From her relationship with her family to her now famous breakup with Woody Allen, you can't help but feel this woman is like
a child. She is passive, always looking up to the men she is with. She never speaks up or speaks out. She always is polite. Perhaps
her convent education in England promoted this but it certainly caused her a lot of trouble. She hopes her children can forgive her
for deferring to Woody what was best for them. Even though she sees the damage his relationship is doing to the children (or lack of relationship)
with them, she feels that because she has mentioned it to him, therapists are involved in the problems, things will be alright. I often thought
what an innocent child she is through all this. I enjoyed this book. I am a fan of Mia's since her Alison days in Peyton Place. I lost touch with
her after Sinatra through Woody, but am glad to have become reacquainted with her.
Rating:
Summary: Beautifully written, honest, a little self-serving
Review: Ms. Farrow has had--and, I'm sure, continues to have--an amazing life, and she chronicles it fairly completely in this memoir. She writes very well, though at times a bit sententiously and over-dramatically. If what she writes about him is true (and the judge who presided over their custody battle apparently thought it was), then Woody Allen--a genius at making movies--is a true monster in other more important ways. She spells this out clearly and convincingly. However, to balance things out, she also has one significant flaw. Woody Allen--the active pedophile, possibly saved from conviction by Mia's desire to not drag her 7-year old daughter through another ugly court battle--is a failed human being. But what to make of Ms Farrow, who clearly spells out his ongoing cruelty to her children, but never seems to be able to say more to him than "Please don't"? She seems so terribly NEEDY, so helpless, so syrupy that at times in the book I wanted to shake her and shout "Grow up! You're an adult! Stop pleading! Fight back! There IS a life without Frank, or Andre, or Woody!" Each of her major relationships with the men in her life infatuation which moved quickly to marriage (or--with Allen--virtual marriage), a very dependent relationship, and fairly rapid loss of her partner's interest in her as a full human being. Her liaison with Allen was simply this pattern writ large, and her children paid what may be a terrible price for her helplessness and blindness, as she herself admits. But this admission does not, I think, fully-enough take her share of the responsibility for standing by placatingly as Allen almost destroyed her never encountered anyone who loves children as she does (clearly it's an obsession, but I suppose there are "positive obsessions") and wants to save ALL of them, especially those whom few others would want to take on. She tells her remarkable story with what appears to be great honesty and courage and a lovely prose style. I'm fascinated by her, and by my reaction to her, because at the same time that I'm very impatient with her, I also admire and respect her for her spiritual quality, her integrity, her capacity for friendship,. I know I'd really like to have her as a friend...and, it appears clear in her memoir, so too do most of the people who have met and worked with her
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