Rating: 
Summary: More than a love story
Review: What many of the reviewers of this book seem to be missing about this work by Ha Jin is its allegorical nature, that draws more than one reminder in this reader's mind to Orwell's "Animal Farm." Yes, it is written in a simple manner both in style and in plot. Some would call this the story's strength and others, it's weakness. One thing is clear, however. The narrative that Ha has crafted is not simply one about lovers who through the constraints of their cultural and political situation cannot consummate their relationship. It is not simply about not being satisfied with what we have and waiting for what we want while life passes us by. Put simply, to classify this a love story is to do this work a disservice.On a symbolic level, Ha is telling us the story of the China of the 20th century and the struggle of its people to come to terms with the convulsive transitions (e.g. Great Leap Forward, Cultural Revolution) that this nation has experienced over the past 100 years. To say that China is a land of complexities and contradictions is a vast understatement. One of the most basic dilemmas of the last century has been the struggle between old China, the land of emperors, Confucius, and bound feet, and new China, industrial and economic man-child, forcing its way into the modern world. This is the conflict around which this story unfolds. Every character is a symbolic representation of larger belief systems, ideas, and positions in modern Chinese society. In this context, it is not difficult to guess what Shuyu and Manna represent. I thoroughly enjoyed this book, because of the poignant statement it makes about the state of China, a land that, as a Chinese-American whose family has lived abroad for 50 years, I have a profound need to connect with. I recommend it wholeheartedly.
Rating: 
Summary: Oh the humanity...
Review: I find it interesting that so many of the previous reviews of this book focus on the constraints a Communist society places on relationships. To me, the message was more about the tendancy for people to be disatisfied with what they have, never being fully happy in the moment. By always waiting for things to improve we can take the focus off how we are feeling in the moment and instead focus on how things will always be better in the future. Without gving anything away, let me say that I belive the end to this book demonstrates this perfectly. In conclusion, I enjoyed this book becuase it operated on a number of levels. It not only delivered a message about oppresive politcal systems, but also one about the basic defects of human nature.
Rating: 
Summary: pretty awful
Review: The only thing of value in this book is the background--China and the way things worked or didn't work in that country before and after Mao. But even that becomes tedious. The characters are about as interesting as stacked wood because wooden is what they are. You learn nothing about them from the way they act or speak. Everything is developed through questions they ask themselves and similar techniques that would earn a "C" in a college writing course. I think the author's background is what won him the award--not the book. After all it is chic of us to heap such honor on a recent arrival to our country. Nothing against that at all but lets be honest about it.
Rating:
Summary: Swept away into a magical world in an unknown China
Review: "Waiting" grabbed me from the first page with its gripping and moving story of frail, mortal human beings in a China very much under the thumb of the Communists. For the first time I saw the people of China as PEOPLE not the faceless masses they are presented as in our media. Ha Jin's story is populated with human characters whose travails became my own as the plot progressed. This to me is the true test of any work of fiction - does it take you away, for a few hours, into a world whose characters' concerns become your own concerns and whose fate becomes, however briefly, your own? This book meets that test. Read it and enjoy something quite special. A very deserving winner of the National Book Award.
Rating:
Summary: Graceful storytelling
Review: The prose is straightforward, elegant, precise, and powerful in an understated way. The novel has little in the way of melodramatic twists and major revelations, so readers looking for them would do better looking elsewhere. Instead, "Waiting" is about helpless lives swept along by political tides, about promises kept but not fulfilled. It's a distinctive vision that rewards a careful reading.
Rating: 
Summary: Underwhelming
Review: Waiting is an easy read.Although I enjoyed the perspective and descriptive prose of a native of communist China, the story line was not challenging enough for me. The story seemed to become choppy and fall apart towards the end.The explanation of Manna's change in behavior towards the end was thin, too. I kept expecting for her to be disgnosed with a nervous disorder.
Rating:
Summary: Waiting for the Point
Review: To me Waiting was a poor man's Remains of the Day, a story of life deferred because of the main character's willingness to conform to convention (in this case, the government of Communist China). For many years a man who has no sense of committment to anything but his advancement in a stultifying bureacratic world refuses to act on his love for a young woman. Life passes them both by. The communist mentality influences every aspect of their lives. The story is tediously slow, going over the same ground over & over. I subsequently read a book about the effects of the communtist mentality which moved me greatly and deepened my understanding of a people wounded psychologically, economically, and politically by the forces of communism--that was Memory of the Forest which is a beautifully written novel with beautiful character development and a gripping narrative. In Waiting you just wait for the characters to gain insight or to do something that is interesting, and it just doesn't happen. How did this book end up as a National Book Award finalist? Please explain.
Rating: 
Summary: I like "Ocean of Words" but not "Waiting"
Review: How can anyone call this even interesting writing? Manna and Lin, the protagonists, are two petty-minded, weak people who, to put it bluntly, deserve all their sufferings. To the misled readers, life is much more interesting in China, in reality or in fiction. Even under the most severe circumstances in that totalitarian state, people have been more adventurous, more courageous and have had more fun than those two losers. Up to page 185, this is a depressing, dreadful, slow-death-evoking tale. But I shall read on just to prove myself wrong. I am not holding my breath. Suggested antidotal reading: Wang Shuo's "Playing for Thrills" or "Please Don't Call Me Human"
Rating:
Summary: Waiting and waiting...
Review: I enjoyed the insight into Chinese culture. I bought this book as a gift for my wife for Christmas. My expectations were high about its creative content. I kept waiting and waiting for a climax which never came. I guess the author was quite ingenious to master the subject, story, and the book's readability into a waiting experience!
Rating:
Summary: disappointing
Review: I was really looking forward to reading this book, because it sounded like it would be very rewarding and thought-provoking. However, nothing about it convinced me that it is worthy of a National Book Award. The writing was elementary, unimpressive, and rather simple. While this made the book a fairly easy read, and while I never seriously thought of not finishing it, whenever the plot would build to some sort of climax (and there weren't any exciting ones, to be sure), the next section or chapter wouldn't deal with it. It was just on to the next thing, which was equally unexciting. I kept hoping something monumental would happen, but halfway through I realized that since the author told the reader the pivotal thing in the first pages of the book, there was nothing else to be told. It plodded along, from year to year, which is I guess the point of the book--that life goes on no matter how we try to change it--and when I reached the end, I was glad to have finished the book so I didn't have to read it anymore. The ending was disappointing also; something happens that makes you think "Aha! So this is the message of the story," but even that falls flat.
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