Rating: 
Summary: decent read
Review: While the message of this book ("Be careful what you wish for" or "The grass is always greener on the other side") has a quality like that of a Grimm's fairy tale, the writing style is much more reserved and devoid of emotion. However, this isn't a criticism. I find that this is often true of Chinese writers and can appreciate the cultural difference. I almost think the writing style enhances Lin Kong's pathetic character by making him seem more bland and spineless. I agree with other readers that Waiting doesn't feel like a love story, but I don't think it's intended to be--it's more an exploration of one man's misinterpretation about what matters most to him in this world. At first, he thinks it is his lover Manna, but after becoming so entangled in this belief that he can't turn back, he realizes that it is his routine and solitude that he most values. I think this novel is worth reading for a look at the culture, but I agree that the subject matter doesn't really leave you feeling satiated at the end.
Rating: 
Summary: Beware of what you are waiting for!
Review: Comrade Manna Wu has spent most of her adult life waiting for the love of a good man that she can call her own. This story gives us a glimpse at the personal lives of couples in Communist China 30 years ago. Manna sets her cap for a doctor in the military hospital where she is a nurse. The doctor, Lin Kong, is torn between the desire for Manna, an intelligent modern Chinese woman that is so far untouched, (nurses must be virgins when they enter the program), and the comfort of his familiar life in the country with a dutiful wife whose bound feet and submissive ways are from an era gone by. Lin's marriage has produced one daughter and the separation between Lin and his wife has gone on for 17 years. So far for various reasons he has been unable to obtain a divorce. In the 18th year of separation he is finally given his freedom to marry Manna Wu. At this point the story takes some unexpected turns that I will save for the reader to discover. Lin is a man who would rather take the easy way out, yet he's concerned with how people view his actions. The 18 years of waiting becomes a comfortable way of life for him, so comfortable that when he is finally freed from the obligations to his wife he realizes that the arrival of his dream might eventually lead to his undoing. A comrade opens Lin's eyes by pointing out that his problem arises from his own character, "If you have the will to change you can create the condition for change". I enjoyed this book on several different levels, it was a twisted love story that kept me reading and rooting for the underdog, and it gave me an appreciation for a culture and way of life completely foreign to me. I certainly couldn't have showed the patience instilled in the females of this culture but that made it all the more interesting to me. 12/12/00
Rating:
Summary: Still waiting
Review: A disclaimer: My wife and I disagree about the literary merit of Ha Jin's Waiting. While I felt it was a perfectly competent novel, but undeserving of NBA, she was moved by the story of the two lovers, waiting for happiness, unable to find meaning in the limted sphere's of their lives. Where my wife found allegory, I found pedantry and clumsy psychology. Where she found interesting detail, I found only superficial description and little insight into a society in the midst of enormous transformation. To cover nearly 2 decades of China's most tumultuous period and hardly mention the pogroms, the reeducation camps, the starvation, detente, the trials of the Gang of War! I woudn't mind the lack of political/historical context if there were psychological subtlety, but alas there isn't any beyond the occasioanal rhetorical question. In short, dear reader, if you want to read a novel about waiting, read Love in the Time of Cholera.
Rating: 
Summary: Surprisingly awkward
Review: I bought this novel expecting and wanting to love it. Unfortunately, I was disappointed by both the style and substance. Although the prose sometimes achieved elegance, it was frequently clumsy and obvious, especially when the author attempted to flesh out the personality and thoughts of the characters. Perhaps this was because the author was attempting to show how simple and callow the characters were, but I don't think so. Also, I found myself bored with the shallow and obvious treatment of some of the major themes - city vs. country, modern vs. traditional, capitalist vs. communist. The structure is good, the author's heart is in the right place, but the execution is clumsy and disappointing.
Rating:
Summary: Weary of Waiting
Review: While I could appreciate this novel as a good (not great)work of literature, its depiction of the dry life of the spirit in Communist China is so realistic that the reader will have a difficult time getting through it. The protagonist is a man with divided loyalties; he has a lover who keeps waiting for him to divorce his faithful, long suffering wife in the country and he knows that he cannot do this and be completely satisfied with his decision. He waits for an opportunity to be able to have everything he wants -- both ways. I struggled to have sympathy with this man or his impatient mistress, but they, along with the wife, are all victims of the coldly impersonal system in which they all must live their lives. There is no freedom of the spirit in their world. The first time I tried to read this book, I simply put it down in frustration. I went back to it and finished it at last, but must say that it was not a book that touched me other than intellectually. Emotionally, it was empty and dry (except for the portrayal of the poor, illiterate country wife), although I believe this was the author's intent. A fable for our times, perhaps.
Rating: 
Summary: disappointing and amateurish
Review: I can't believe that this book actually won an award. Obviously, the reviewers have no recognition for good literature or it was politically biased. I wish I hadn't wasted my money. House of Sand and Fog, which was up for the same award, should have gotten it. Some one once said, "there are no good books, there are no bad books," except "Waiting."
Rating:
Summary: But _I_ Was Going to Call it Sparse!
Review: I see that people have beat me to it. Waiting is a no frills novel that cuts through the extras of life and gets right to the brunt of the problem, which, in this case, is the "love affair" between an army doctor and nurse in communist China. The characters are all wonderfully developed, though not particularly as people that you'd want to spend heaps of time with yourself. It's not a novel, though, that leaves the reader with a sense of satisfaction when he or she has finished it. Perhaps it's because Ha Jin tells his story about the senselessness of life but doesn't offer any convenient salvation for Lin and Manna, the two "lovers." And though I know that sometimes life goes that way, people are disappointed, frustrated, and unhappy, I guess that in a way I read books to get away from all that. Still, Waiting is well written and gives you a periferal insight into Chinese society, but it's most certainly neither a relaxing nor joyous read.
Rating:
Summary: Spare and elegant...NOT!
Review: Because I love writing which is (truly) "spare and elegant," it irritates me to see this phrase so blithely thrown around--such as by many of the reviewers of this decent, but not great, novel. Many of Jin's descriptions of the natural surroundings (in the city and in his home village) are, indeed, spare and elegant. Where Jin gets into trouble is in describing his characters' thoughts and actions. In these sections, his writing is often klunky and melodramatic. If you want truly spare and elegant (and great) writing, try Ron Hansen, Cormac McCarthy, or Michael Ondaatje. And, as for reading about Chinese culture, I'll take Amy Tan any day.
Rating:
Summary: Cultural insight
Review: I don't believe it is fair for me to review the plot, the storyline or the character development in this book. I liked the book for the insight I believe I received into Chinese society, thinking and view of relationships. Even though fiction, I felt special in reading this book. I felt as if I knew the characters, could understand their very oriental motivations and could appreciate the beautiful analogies and words that describe the situations and the characters' reactions. I feel that Ha Jin has enhanced my understanding of a great many things as a result of reading his fiction.
Rating:
Summary: a window opened to a different world and deep into our soul
Review: I just finished reading WAITING snd 1. I enjoyed reading it 2.I have a feeling of catarzis 3.I learned a lot about life in China It is a weird story about weird people that abstain thmselves from love making for 28 years it is a weird society with weird rules but the people are people and they don't seem so weird because they seem human and real. I don't know yet what will sink in me from this book in the long run but for sure a lot of knowledge abut the athmospere and life in China and also some insights about love relations and mariage. I recommend.
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