Waiting in Vain
by Colin Channer
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Book Summary Information
Author: Colin ChannerEdition: Hardcover
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 1998-06-23
ISBN: 0965684261
Number of pages: 346
Publisher: One World/Ballantine
Book Reviews of Waiting in Vain
Book Review: Waiting in Vain -- Fire and light in multi-faceted gem
Summary: 5 Stars
December 28, 1998 The bumper crop of new novels in the black love story genre has proven the obvious--the existence of a long-deprived, but only recently discovered market, hungry for works that reflect the black experience in love and life. At a point that the genre appeared to be settling into the formulaic and predictable, Colin Channer's debut takes dead aim at satisfying a more discerning appetite. As its warm reception amply demonstrates--Number 1 on Essence magazine's Black bestsellers list--it's a bulls-eye. A gifted storyteller and graceful, lyrical writer, Channer offers up finely etched characters, and an amazing ear for dialogue (complete with the musical cadence of the Jamaican patois) and a carefully crafted storyline that captures the experiences and issues that fascinate, preoccupy, and counfound Black people. It also treats readers to an experience so rare as to have hardly registered as long missing--a richly detailed exploration in healthy, Black, heterosexual masculinity. On the surface, a fast-paced trans-Atlantic love story set against the backdrop of the glitzy, glamorous art world, Channer pushes far beyond romance. He deftly depicts the particular twist that the Black experience gives to issues of caste, class, status, self-esteem, achievement, and security and how it informs, and sometimes distorts, the possibilities for love and friendship. Sylvia, orphaned and abused as a child, is a talented magazine editor, intelligent, cultured, and beautiful. Proud of her achievements, she fiercely protects the markers of status that show just how far she has come. She fears and avoids any choice that may result in a backward slip into circumstances and a life more in keeping with her hardscrabble beginnings. Involved with a handsome, powerful, and successful man--perhaps a bit arrogant and shallow--she views love as a practical matter just as much as (perhaps more than?) the province of the heart and soul. Fire, Jamaican born and bred, comes from a privileged background and is a charming and well-educated writer--romantic, worldly, intelligent, accomplished and evolved. Recently burnt and fearful of same, he is irresistably drawn to Sylvia from the moment that their paths cross, but all too aware of the potential (even likelihood) for searing disappointment given her circumstances. Ian, Fire's best friend, achieves acclaim and recognition in the heady, cutthroat, and fickle international art world. But as an Indian, a low caste in Jamaican society, he has neither healed from deep feelings of unworthiness nor developed a spiritually rooted sense of self. Despite his great talent, Ian remains greviously vulnerable, weakened, wounded and angry. The well developed context for understanding Fire and Sylvia makes clear how nothing about their forging, developing and sustaining a relationship would be easy. Their struggle shows how the primal urges toward survival, self-protection, holding on, and climbing up can misinform and misguide choices. It also shows how courage, compassion, and trust in the needs of the heart and soul might spare the characters from forever waiting in vain. The tortured friendship between Ian and Fire offers an additional prism for exploring the roles of maturity, self-expression, and responsbility in love--even filial. Black women's weariness and frustration in failing to figure/work out some of these issues in our own lives may account for the popularity of the "trifling brother" sub-genre of the black love story. These novels draw readers into the heat of battle, but offer little by way of edifying light. In Channer's multi-faceted gem, the heat emanates not from battle, but from the vivid, evocative, steamy, sensual, and passionate love scenes. The light comes from the richly illuminated exploration of how Fire, a strong black man in possession of well-developed emotional/spiritual tools, a strong sense of self, wherewithal and will, expresses and demonstrates through word, action, and deed his (perhaps futile) love for Sylvia. Shining through Channer's writing is a deep compassion for his characters with all their foibles. Like author Wally Lamb (She's Come Undone), he trusts his ability to portray the innermost feelings of women. In Channer's deft hands, Sylvia's character is fully realized. There is no doubt that Sylvia loves Fire. But she is unsure of his prospects and fearful of losing hard-won ground. In one memorable scene, for example, her choices move her inexorably into a mortifying situation that Fire witnesses. In it, her struggle and embarrassment is palpable as she dangles, utterly exposed, in exquisite irresolution, between compromise and resignation, on the one hand, and longing and possiblity, on the other. In view of this book's depth, wisdom, intelligence and worldview, it could be excused for not being much fun. But it is an intoxicating roller coaster ride taking us to Kingston, New York, and London as the lovers attempt to overcome fear, and to trust in the truest parts of themselves and the power of love.
Summary of Waiting in Vain
"I'm a Jamaican. Yardie to de bloodclaat core. I love stout more than wine. I love cricket more than baseball. . . . I love Bob Marley more than Beethoven or Basie. . . . And I think that the fat on a woman batty and hips is sexy thing that they shouldn't try to lose at the gym. . . ."As the clock nears midnight, a travel-weary man steps out of the New York subway where Chinatown collides with Soho and TriBeCa. He strides up West Broadway in his tough, scuffed boots past cafés and bars. Then he sees her, and a spark is lit. She walks like a dancer, and trailing behind her in the coltish breeze is a light silk scarf whose flutter he deems
romantic. . . .
Meet Fire--Jamaican born, charming, poetic, and talented--a man who's vowed to never play "love-is-blind" games again. Then he meets Sylvia, a beautiful magazine editor who keeps her passions under lock and key. Together they must choose between the love in their lives and the love of their lives.
Waiting in Vain is a sexy, hypnotic, and beautifully written novel of two souls who meet by chance--then fall hard and fast in a precarious world of hopeful dreamers. With an amazing gift for capturing the subtle Jamaican cadences of his characters' voices, in prose that drips of passion both carnal and pure, Colin Channer immerses us in the fast-paced, often cutthroat art world where sculptors, writers, poets, musicians, gallery owners, and benefactors all reach for success at the expense of themselves and the truth.
From the galleries of Soho to the brownstones of Brooklyn, from the nightclubs of London to the streets of Kingston, Jamaica, Channer takes us on a wild, soul-searching ride as Fire and Sylvia try to connect, disconnect, and reconnect amid conflicting desires and wounds from the past. But through intricate love triangles, skewed priorities, and crushing personal tragedies, Fire, Sylvia, and their friends must learn that some things in life are worth fighting for. If not, you're simply waiting in vain.
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