Ask five listeners who's actually at fault in this audiobook's central breakup and you'll get real disagreement, which is a better sign for a romance audiobook than five reviewers nodding along in unison. Wait for U splits its readers on exactly that question, and the disagreement itself tells you more about the book than a stack of matching five-star praise would.
Couture Yates and Khari Compton fell for each other as teenagers, weathered years of Khari mistreating that trust, and then lost each other entirely after a tragedy the synopsis doesn't spell out in detail. Years later, adult Khari is successful and still hung up on his teenage love, while Couture struggles to reconcile the boy who hurt her with the man he's become. Tony Isabella narrates this second entry in Shvonne Latrice's Crenshaw Kings series, and the story leans hard into second-chance-romance territory built on real, unresolved damage rather than a clean slate. The synopsis frames the emotional core plainly: Couture "often struggles to move past" the relationship "no matter how much she tries," while Khari has developed "tunnel vision so solid that any woman attempting to penetrate it is simply wasting their time," a detail he's apparently willing to say to other women's faces without hesitation. Whether that tunnel vision cracks the moment Couture reappears, and how believable the story makes that crack feel, is really the whole engine driving the plot forward from there.
Reviewer Read by Michelè takes the harder line on Couture specifically, arguing in a review titled "Growth vs. Self-Sabotage" that "Couture was the real opp in this story," unable to get past comparing "grown Khari to teenage Khari" even after he stayed faithful and stuck around for years. That's a genuinely critical read of the book's heroine, not the kind of uncomplicated cheerleading you might expect from a five-star rating.
Highlights
Vonn's review frames the appeal in terms of emotional range rather than plot mechanics, calling it "an emotional journey about timing, trust, and love that refuses to die even when life throws every obstacle in the way," and specifically praising how the book depicts "frustration to joy, brokenness to healing." That same review credits the character work as the reason any of it lands emotionally: "What I loved is how real the characters felt. They were flawed and complicated, I felt the chemistry, the heartbreak, the hesitation," and more running through the story, in that reviewer's own words. Icee C's review, posted from the United Kingdom, describes an almost anxious reading experience, admitting to putting the book down for stretches because of how "skressed" (a deliberate spelling, not a typo I've introduced) the story made that reviewer feel, before picking it back up and finishing because, as the review puts it, "sis is a beast with her pen."
May Rayne's review adds a piece of context that reframes the whole book: that reviewer had deliberately avoided Wait for U after disliking eighteen-year-old Khari in an earlier Crenshaw Kings entry called The Marriage Favor, where his choices "got people killed" and his treatment of Couture soured the character entirely. Only after building trust in Latrice's writing through other books in the series did May Rayne circle back, and came away persuaded: "Grown man Khari for the win!" That's a meaningful arc for a reader to describe in a review, actively avoiding a book because of a character, then being won over by how that same character is written years later. It also suggests this entry does real work rehabilitating Khari in the eyes of readers who'd already written him off, rather than simply assuming existing series goodwill would carry a difficult character through on inertia alone.
What to Watch For in Wait for U
Eat. Sleep. Read.'s review is the most specific about craft, awarding four stars rather than five over one clear structural complaint: "it became redundant to keep being told about how in love they were, what broke them up and why, and why they can't let each other go." That reviewer is careful to add that "each instance was well-written," so the issue is repetition of an already-established point rather than weak prose, a distinction worth holding onto if pacing matters to you. That reviewer still recommends the series overall, calling both entries read so far "2/2 highly recommend" and noting both "held my attention from beginning to end," so the repetition complaint reads as a specific, bounded critique rather than a broader dismissal of the writing.
4.7 is what's displayed across 4 counted votes on the rating front, and that figure only works out under a truncation method rather than standard rounding, so I won't present any of the underlying math as settled. What's clear regardless of the exact arithmetic is that even reviewers awarding full marks, like Read by Michelè, aren't shy about criticizing the heroine's choices directly inside a five-star review.
Is This One for You?
Series listeners curious how Khari's arc resolves after his rockier portrayal earlier in Crenshaw Kings are the obvious audience, and May Rayne's turnaround is a genuinely useful data point if you're on the fence for the same reason. Anyone who enjoys morally complicated leads, where reviewers themselves disagree about who deserves more sympathy, will find real material to chew on here rather than a tidy morality tale, and Tony Isabella's narration gives this particular installment its own distinct voice. Skip it if Eat. Sleep. Read.'s repetition complaint sounds like a dealbreaker, since a second-chance romance built on revisiting the same wound naturally risks circling that wound more than once. Otherwise, this earns its reputation as a genuine team-splitting entry in the series, in the best possible sense.
- Performance: Tony Isabella narrates this second Crenshaw Kings entry, distinct from the voices behind other installments in this series.
- What it covers: second-chance love after real damage, growth versus self-sabotage, forgiving who someone used to be
- Feel: Emotionally intense and occasionally anxiety-inducing, per one reviewer's own description
- Our call: Its own five-star reviewers genuinely disagree with each other, and that friction is part of what makes it worth hearing.
Common Questions
Do reviewers agree on whether Couture or Khari is more at fault in this audiobook?
No, and that disagreement is one of the more interesting things about the review column. Read by Michelè argues Couture bears more blame for holding onto the past, while other reviewers focus on Khari's earlier mistreatment of her, so expect a genuinely debated central relationship rather than a one-sided romance.
What's the total runtime of the Wait for U audiobook?
This second Crenshaw Kings installment, published through Recorded Books, totals 12 hours and 14 minutes with Tony Isabella at the mic. The story spans Couture and Khari's teenage relationship, the tragedy that separates them, and their complicated adult reunion years later.
