Rating: 
Summary: disappointing
Review: The comparison with KITCHEN CONFIDENTIAL is not favorable to WAITING. The Bourdain book is funny and stylish. You may not like Bourdain personally (although I did) but you come away knowing the most entertaining parts of his business, his cohorts, his life. And you will receive a thorough education on the restaurant business without even knowing it, as this is woven into the stories and characters. WAITING is boring. The book has no laughs, and no memorable characters. You can infer the sort of "wry humor" that some reviewers have mentioned by Ginsburg's chapter title: "Tipping (It's Not a City in China)". That was a hopelessly bland cliche twenty years ago (I was a bartender for twelve years) and I am embarrassed for Ginsburg that she thinks this is a witticism. This book is a motherlode of honest, earnest reflections from an unworldly working server. I'm sure the duller sort of waitress I used to work with will find this book validates her experiences. Great. The main problem is the author's main stance is that she is a working class hero and that her profession deserves more respect. As such, it is sort of a complaint. I can imagine many people reading it and saying "Yes, that's true. Yes, that happened to me." I can't imagine any smart person reading it and being delighted by some unexpected insight or story. There's nothing complex, strange, or unexpected here, which makes for a bad confessional. I mean, to tell us that our next server might very well be an intelligent, talented person who just happens to carry trays for the money is to provide a condescending lecture. Ginsburg is not a bad person. She doesn't have the sleazy often sinistar qualities of an Anthony Bourdain. And that's a real problem with her book!
Rating: 
Summary: This is the gift to give....
Review: So funny and truly telling that I was amazed. Most of us at one time or another have waited or served coffee or just done the grunt work that never seems appreciated. Well this book just recounts all of that. I wish I had the will and patience to write a book also, but Debra does a great job of telling all of our stories. This book is the gift to give for those people who you have no idea what to get for them. Anyone can appreciate it and it could be especially helpfull to those who have never waited. Maybe, just maybe they'll finally get a clue and realize you may just be getting more than you bargained for in your dinner. ...
Rating: 
Summary: The Real Dish
Review: Forget the guy who learned everything he needed to know in kindergarten. Debra Ginsberg got her education in restaurants, and she doles it out just right in this entertaining account. In 20 years of taking orders for everything from popovers to piña coladas, she gathered a trove of stories she justly terms "passionate, absurd and intimately human." Between shifts Ginsberg provides us with endearing glimpses of her large and colorful family -- as a waiter, her dad supported his wife and five kids on tips alone. There are also sporadic helpings of her checkered love life. But Ginsberg recalls her romantic failures with nary a hint of bitterness, including the one with the ex-waiter who fathered her son. Best of all is the inside look at staff romances and the truth about whether a server or cook, if pushed too far by a customer, will spit -- or worse -- in your soup. (Don't ask.) A fun, slightly cracked, fluffy omelet of a book. Hold the cheese please!
Rating:
Summary: To Insure Pleasure - - - Read Something Else
Review: An utterly disappointing read. Overall, this book was a total waste of time. I'd read the other reviews looking forward to a delightful read giving me some insight into the food industry and the entire waitstaff experience and was totally let down. It was like expecting the Palm for a delicious steak and getting to dine at Goober's Dew Drop Inn. Need I say more.
Rating:
Summary: Deserves much more than a 15% tip
Review: Debra Ginsberg is a writer, and obviously a good one. But, for most of her life, she's also earned the bulk of her income from being a waitress. In WAITING: THE TRUE CONFESSIONS OF A WAITRESS, she describes what it's been like serving demanding, hungry humans, and possibly you or me, since her first job at 16 in her father's luncheonette. Debra's table-waiting odyssey takes her from upstate New York to Yellowstone to Portland, Oregon to Southern California. In various chapters, she educates the reader on the theory and practice of tipping, the waitress's definition of "personal service", the hierarchy of restaurant employees, the relation between food and sex, the screen image of the waitress as portrayed since 1970, the highs and lows of the various dine-out holidays (Mother's Day, Valentine's Day, Christmas Eve, New Years Eve, etc.), the uniqueness of the cocktail waitress, the reality of choosing wines, the perils of the "split shift", and the art of triaging multiple food orders from several tables. And, because she was, and is, a single mother, the image of the pregnant waitress as perceived by customers and restaurant management. WAITING could be considered a companion piece to KITCHEN CONFIDENTIAL (also reviewed by me on this website), an "exposé" of the restaurant business as seen from the perspective of a professional chef. However, there is one big difference between Ginsberg and the author of the other, Anthony Bourdain. I like the personality of the former, while that of the latter I found truly obnoxious and annoying. My only disappointment with Ginsberg's style was its relative lack of humor compared to what it might have been. Her chapter on the relation between food and sex was funny, not because of the way she made the connection, but because humans naturally seem to put themselves in comedic sexual situations. Now that the desert is consumed and the tab is waiting to be paid, I'll gratefully leave Debra much more than the standard 15%. Nice job!
Rating: 
Summary: Not Worth the Wait
Review: I was disappointed in this book. As a former waitress myself, I found this book devoid of the true essence and excitement of working in the restaurant industry. There are missed opportunities to go into detail about colleagues or customers and pull the reader deeper into her tale. Instead, the book is a mishmash of people and places that never build a connection compelling enough to want to read on. The book's only "true confession" is that Ms. Ginsberg does not have a very high opinion of her profession or her customers.
Rating:
Summary: Honest and Heartfelt
Review: This is an enjoyable and well balanced book about a truly unbalanced business! My father made me keep my truck stop waitress job the summer before I left for college; it took me a while to understand why he did that. Read this book and you'll know why without having to work in a dive like I did. Ginsberg keeps a fine balance between love and hate, details and sensationalism.
Rating:
Summary: Somethings just come natural to some people
Review: Waiting tells wonderful tales of one woman's life as a server and she is proud of it. Most people deny that the serve people for a living and it's only a part-time job. But Ginsberg holds her head high and the whole truth about the resturant. She tells in detail who it showed who to accept and judge people and how it showed her real responsbility when she become a single parent.
Rating: 
Summary: Inconsistent service from this waitress...
Review: I'd leave Ginsberg an average tip for this non-fiction book about the waiting profession. When it was good- it was very good. At times, Ginsberg was very witty and the stories she tells of her customers over the years were marvelous. But when it wasn't so good, it was a tedious read. I found myself slugging through some of the book in search of (possibly) another good part. Put it this way,it wasn't so bad that you won't want to finish it, but it wasn't the kind of read you'd find that keeps you up 'til 2 a.m. to finish it. Some of the characters or scenes she describes- I found disjointed- why is this in here?- kind of feeling. I liked it and I didn't like it. So I think I'd give this waitress between a 12-15% tip. (My tip to you is- get it at the library but don't buy it).
Rating:
Summary: The most unfulfilling of meals
Review: I can't understand why this book was published. There are so many good books in this genre (try "Tender at the Bone" or the restaurant chapter of "Saturday Night," for example), why publish one that has nothing going for it? The author has no mastery over the use of description, there's no detail about the places, the characters, the work, even her experiences. it's a quick, easy read, but like fast-food, you aren;t so happy when you're finished.
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