Open Water
by Caleb Azumah Nelson
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Description
"In a crowded London pub, two young people meet. Both are Black British, both won scholarships to private schools where they struggled to belong, both are now artists-he a photographer, she a dancer-and both are trying to make their mark in a world that by turns celebrates and rejects them. Tentatively, tenderly, they fall in love. But two people who seem destined to be together can still be torn apart by fear and violence, and over the course of a year they find their relationship tested by show more forces beyond their control. Narrated with deep intimacy, Open Water is at once an achingly beautiful love story and a potent insight into race and masculinity that asks what it means to be a person in a world that sees you only as a Black body; to be vulnerable when you are only respected for strength; to find safety in love, only to lose it. With gorgeous, soulful intensity, and blistering emotional intelligence, Caleb Azumah Nelson gives a profoundly sensitive portrait of romantic love in all its feverish waves and comforting beauty. This is one of the most essential debut novels of recent years, heralding the arrival of a stellar and prodigious young talent"-- show lessTags
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Member Reviews
Winner of 2021 Costa First Novel Prize.
“Language is flimsy... Language fails us, always."
Here, it’s flimsy and reflective, but it doesn’t fail. Poetic prose and liturgical repetition delicately juxtapose a love story alongside the terror of quotidian micro and macro-aggressions that Black people have to live with. Until they don't.
"It's one thing to be looked at and another to be seen."
It opens at a barbers: a place of mirrors and gazes, looking and seeing, and a hub of the Black community. Reflections and reflecting: seeing yourself as others see you.
The contrast between being looked at and actually being seen is stamped on the story, often explicitly, and other times letting the reader fill in the now familiar phrase. show more Hypnotic, liturgical ripples. Contrasts and parallels: a mirror is passive, open water is active, and the gaze of a camera is different again. Shiny facets of yourself.
Image: A shard of mirror on open water, and a woman holding a mirror by Elisabeth Toll (Source)
It’s told in the second person, present tense. Thus, “you” mostly refers to the unnamed narrator, but sometimes to the young woman, his best friend. It creates a beautifully reflective distance that is perfect for the themes, while keeping the immediacy and directness of the here and now.
The need to tell a story
“You came here to speak of what it means to love your best friend. A direct gaze. An honest man.”
The narrator is a photographer who wants to document Black people in London. He meets a young woman at a party, introduced by her boyfriend. They immediately bond over the shared experience of having been Black scholarship kids at neighbouring elite private schools.
I never felt unwelcome, but there was always something I didn’t feel privy to.”
She is a literature student in Dublin, and also a dancer. Music is another bond; the book has a soundtrack - on vinyl. The needle traces a spiral, like ripples on water, or a dance on a floor.
Image: Sculpture of a dancer, titled “Seaside” by Isabel Miramontes (Source)
“You came here, to the page, to ask for forgiveness and to tell the truth.”
From love to fear
“You’ve been wondering about your own relationship to open water. You’ve been wondering about the trauma and how it always finds its way to the surface… You have always thought if you opened your mouth in open water you would drown, but if you didn’t open your mouth you would suffocate.”
It’s an ethereal, watery portrayal of friendship and love (with echoes of the central question in Normal People and When Harry Met Sally). Then, shortly before the halfway point, there’s a painful memory of being assaulted by vigilantes. It’s detached, but still raw. Probably PTSD. But he’s never told anyone, because it’s normal. Always seen as a Black body. A potential threat. Knowing “that your bodies are not your own”.
“Sometimes you forget you haven’t done anything wrong… that to be you is to be unseen and unheard… a Black body, and not much else.”
Image: Black hands, handcuffed by white police officer (Source)
The tone and balance of the books shifts to deeper, darker waters. More memories surface:
“You’re free to go now, they say. ‘Are we ever?” Leon asks.”
Quotes
Many of these quotes occur several times, in slightly modified form.
• “Her eyes… silvered like mirrored glass, the reflection of yourself warped and warbled.”
• “Your eyes meet in the silence. The gaze requires no words at all. It is an honest meeting.”
• “To not fill your time with someone is to trust, and to trust is to love… Trust is to fill that time with each other.”
• “You are not thinking. You’re feeling. You are in a memory of something yet to happen.”
• “It’s a strange thing, to desire your best friend; two pairs of hands wandering past boundaries, asking forgiveness rather than permission.”
• “How does one shake off desire? To give it a voice is to sow a seed.”
• “She takes in her surroundings like a traveller mapping new lands. You watch her eyes graze over the photographs.”
• “You dream the police wrote your death story and only included your name as a footnote.”
• “Too many policemen for one woman. A knee on the woman’s back.”
• “The face of a man who will try again another day” and a victim who “knew he had been marked for destruction.”
• “Sometimes it’s easier to hide in your own darkness than to emerge, naked and vulnerable, blinking in your own light.”
• “The scrubbing of identity with syllables that have never been your name.”
• “The silence was heavy with all that was not said.”
Flotsam
I wanted to swim in the open water, but I didn’t believe the instant deep bond from which all else flowed.
The book is flooded with beautiful, reverent repetition. And two inelegant and unnecessary repetitions, one of which may not age well: sweating and Uber. show less
“Language is flimsy... Language fails us, always."
Here, it’s flimsy and reflective, but it doesn’t fail. Poetic prose and liturgical repetition delicately juxtapose a love story alongside the terror of quotidian micro and macro-aggressions that Black people have to live with. Until they don't.
"It's one thing to be looked at and another to be seen."
It opens at a barbers: a place of mirrors and gazes, looking and seeing, and a hub of the Black community. Reflections and reflecting: seeing yourself as others see you.
The contrast between being looked at and actually being seen is stamped on the story, often explicitly, and other times letting the reader fill in the now familiar phrase. show more Hypnotic, liturgical ripples. Contrasts and parallels: a mirror is passive, open water is active, and the gaze of a camera is different again. Shiny facets of yourself.
Image: A shard of mirror on open water, and a woman holding a mirror by Elisabeth Toll (Source)
It’s told in the second person, present tense. Thus, “you” mostly refers to the unnamed narrator, but sometimes to the young woman, his best friend. It creates a beautifully reflective distance that is perfect for the themes, while keeping the immediacy and directness of the here and now.
The need to tell a story
“You came here to speak of what it means to love your best friend. A direct gaze. An honest man.”
The narrator is a photographer who wants to document Black people in London. He meets a young woman at a party, introduced by her boyfriend. They immediately bond over the shared experience of having been Black scholarship kids at neighbouring elite private schools.
I never felt unwelcome, but there was always something I didn’t feel privy to.”
She is a literature student in Dublin, and also a dancer. Music is another bond; the book has a soundtrack - on vinyl. The needle traces a spiral, like ripples on water, or a dance on a floor.
Image: Sculpture of a dancer, titled “Seaside” by Isabel Miramontes (Source)
“You came here, to the page, to ask for forgiveness and to tell the truth.”
From love to fear
“You’ve been wondering about your own relationship to open water. You’ve been wondering about the trauma and how it always finds its way to the surface… You have always thought if you opened your mouth in open water you would drown, but if you didn’t open your mouth you would suffocate.”
It’s an ethereal, watery portrayal of friendship and love (with echoes of the central question in Normal People and When Harry Met Sally). Then, shortly before the halfway point, there’s a painful memory of being assaulted by vigilantes. It’s detached, but still raw. Probably PTSD. But he’s never told anyone, because it’s normal. Always seen as a Black body. A potential threat. Knowing “that your bodies are not your own”.
“Sometimes you forget you haven’t done anything wrong… that to be you is to be unseen and unheard… a Black body, and not much else.”
Image: Black hands, handcuffed by white police officer (Source)
The tone and balance of the books shifts to deeper, darker waters. More memories surface:
“Drowned by the screech-squeal-scream of get out of the car get out of the car get out of the car. They ordered you to the ground for symbolic purposes. Playing dead. You let out a skinny whimper sharp as a butter knife. You heard the sound rattle in your chest, pressing shut unserious features. Total eclipse. When you came to, you were beside yourself. This is what it means to die, you thought. Total eclipse. The sky turned black. Ha. You looked in one of their eyes and saw the image of the Devil. He had an index finger gripping the trigger, like he was holding on to a life-line. He looked scared, behind the crumpled forehead, the hard eyes, he looked scared. He looked scared of what he did not know, of what was different… You fit the profile. You fit the description. You don’t fit in the box he has squeezed you in. He looks scared, They all did. You wouldn’t accept their apologies, nor their extended hands, because even these are weapons in the darkness.”
“You’re free to go now, they say. ‘Are we ever?” Leon asks.”
Quotes
Many of these quotes occur several times, in slightly modified form.
• “Her eyes… silvered like mirrored glass, the reflection of yourself warped and warbled.”
• “Your eyes meet in the silence. The gaze requires no words at all. It is an honest meeting.”
• “To not fill your time with someone is to trust, and to trust is to love… Trust is to fill that time with each other.”
• “You are not thinking. You’re feeling. You are in a memory of something yet to happen.”
• “It’s a strange thing, to desire your best friend; two pairs of hands wandering past boundaries, asking forgiveness rather than permission.”
• “How does one shake off desire? To give it a voice is to sow a seed.”
• “She takes in her surroundings like a traveller mapping new lands. You watch her eyes graze over the photographs.”
• “You dream the police wrote your death story and only included your name as a footnote.”
• “Too many policemen for one woman. A knee on the woman’s back.”
• “The face of a man who will try again another day” and a victim who “knew he had been marked for destruction.”
• “Sometimes it’s easier to hide in your own darkness than to emerge, naked and vulnerable, blinking in your own light.”
• “The scrubbing of identity with syllables that have never been your name.”
• “The silence was heavy with all that was not said.”
Flotsam
I wanted to swim in the open water, but I didn’t believe the instant deep bond from which all else flowed.
The book is flooded with beautiful, reverent repetition. And two inelegant and unnecessary repetitions, one of which may not age well: sweating and Uber. show less
What makes this book powerful is how it describes the experience of being a young Black man, and the injustice and pain that he faces simply by existing. What makes that experience heart breaking is how the societal injustice endangers his personal happiness. It hurts to witness how a promising romance is sabotaged by the protagonist's inability to express to his partner how scared and angry he feels by the racism he encounters daily. The author's impressionistic writing style seems to be trying to replicate music, with repeating motifs and more emphasis on feelings than details. Recommended for all libraries.
‘’You came here to speak of shame and its relation to desire. There should be no shame in openly saying, I want this. There should be no shame in not knowing what one wants.’’
Love. What a simple, yet puzzling, complicated, frightening word. What beauty and terror are hidden in four letters. Love brings countless complications. One of the most intense comes when two best friends realise they have actually fallen in love with each other. He is a young man, a photographer. She is a free spirit, interested in writing and dance is her means to express herself. They meet, they collaborate, they become best friends. But it is clear that they fell in love at first sight. What happens when you find a soulmate but risk losing your true show more friend? As months go by, wandering in the buzzing metropolis of London, we watch two people who try to understand each other and themselves. And their story becomes our own.
‘’Language fails us, and sometimes our parents do, too. We all fail each other, sometimes small, sometimes big, but look, when we love we trust, and when we fail, we fracture that joint.’’
What is in store for our couple? Both are Black British, both are artists. Both are navigating an absurd world that most of the times sees you as a ‘’Black’’ body. The story is written in second-person narration which is my favourite literary technique when done properly. And here it is presented to absolute perfection. Exclusively seen through the eyes of the young man, we are guided into a story that examines love and relationships within a troubled and troubling society. A society that still succumbs to racism and discrimination and violence comes all too easily. This is far from a ‘’civilised’’ time…
Art is an escape, a means to express your feelings and understand yourself. Before you let Anger take over you. Anger because the world is mad, mad to its rotten core. Before you are smothered by the overwhelming feeling that you are not ‘’good enough’’, the constant need to apologise. Before you surrender to your fear of expressing your thoughts to the one you love. But if you retreat deeper and deeper into your shell, you’ll get lost. And if you bedn too much, you will break. Your homeland, the land of your ancestors, the land of your beloved grandma is always on your mind. You need freedom, you need for fear to disappear, but the line between being cautious and being selfish is too thin.
In London and in Dublin. In our own home, in our own heart. That’s where this outstanding novel takes us. Loving someone so much that it becomes frightening. Baring your soul is terrifying. Love is swimming in open water, against the current. Written with quiet beauty, tenderness and pain, this is the story of the love between two people, the story of a community where hatred and violence drive everyone apart. The story that shows that nothing has really changed. The story in which, one way or another, we can spot ourselves.
A remarkable debut. One of the finest books of the year.
‘’It is the wrong season to have a crush. Meeting someone on a summer’s evening is like giving a dead flame new life. You are more likely to wander outside with this person for a reprieve from whatever sweatbox you are being housed in. You might find yourself accepting the offer of a cigarette, your eyes narrowing as the nicotine trickles your brain and you exhale into the stiff heat of a London night. You might look towards the end and realise he blue doesn’t quite deepen during these months. In winter, you are content to scoop your ashes away and head home.’’
Many thanks to Grove Press and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.
My reviews can also be found on https://theopinionatedreaderblog.wordpress.com/ show less
Love. What a simple, yet puzzling, complicated, frightening word. What beauty and terror are hidden in four letters. Love brings countless complications. One of the most intense comes when two best friends realise they have actually fallen in love with each other. He is a young man, a photographer. She is a free spirit, interested in writing and dance is her means to express herself. They meet, they collaborate, they become best friends. But it is clear that they fell in love at first sight. What happens when you find a soulmate but risk losing your true show more friend? As months go by, wandering in the buzzing metropolis of London, we watch two people who try to understand each other and themselves. And their story becomes our own.
‘’Language fails us, and sometimes our parents do, too. We all fail each other, sometimes small, sometimes big, but look, when we love we trust, and when we fail, we fracture that joint.’’
What is in store for our couple? Both are Black British, both are artists. Both are navigating an absurd world that most of the times sees you as a ‘’Black’’ body. The story is written in second-person narration which is my favourite literary technique when done properly. And here it is presented to absolute perfection. Exclusively seen through the eyes of the young man, we are guided into a story that examines love and relationships within a troubled and troubling society. A society that still succumbs to racism and discrimination and violence comes all too easily. This is far from a ‘’civilised’’ time…
Art is an escape, a means to express your feelings and understand yourself. Before you let Anger take over you. Anger because the world is mad, mad to its rotten core. Before you are smothered by the overwhelming feeling that you are not ‘’good enough’’, the constant need to apologise. Before you surrender to your fear of expressing your thoughts to the one you love. But if you retreat deeper and deeper into your shell, you’ll get lost. And if you bedn too much, you will break. Your homeland, the land of your ancestors, the land of your beloved grandma is always on your mind. You need freedom, you need for fear to disappear, but the line between being cautious and being selfish is too thin.
In London and in Dublin. In our own home, in our own heart. That’s where this outstanding novel takes us. Loving someone so much that it becomes frightening. Baring your soul is terrifying. Love is swimming in open water, against the current. Written with quiet beauty, tenderness and pain, this is the story of the love between two people, the story of a community where hatred and violence drive everyone apart. The story that shows that nothing has really changed. The story in which, one way or another, we can spot ourselves.
A remarkable debut. One of the finest books of the year.
‘’It is the wrong season to have a crush. Meeting someone on a summer’s evening is like giving a dead flame new life. You are more likely to wander outside with this person for a reprieve from whatever sweatbox you are being housed in. You might find yourself accepting the offer of a cigarette, your eyes narrowing as the nicotine trickles your brain and you exhale into the stiff heat of a London night. You might look towards the end and realise he blue doesn’t quite deepen during these months. In winter, you are content to scoop your ashes away and head home.’’
Many thanks to Grove Press and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.
My reviews can also be found on https://theopinionatedreaderblog.wordpress.com/ show less
I received a free advanced reader’s copy fron Edelweiss and the publisher. This did not affect my opinion on the book.
This book was so beautifully written. I love the bold choice of telling the story from the second-person point of view; not many books I’ve read are like that, and the ones that are don’t do it well like this one does. I quickly fell in love with not only the writing style, but the characters as well. I had trouble putting it down.
That said, this was not a light read. With issues such as police brutality, racial trauma, and so on addressed, the poetic language acts as a device to drive in just how real these issues are, not to diminish these topics nor to demean the severity of them.
Overall, this was an amazing and show more important read. It’s one of the best books I’ve read in a while.
Completed for the 2021 Popsugar Reading Challenge; prompt #1—a book that’s published in 2021 show less
This book was so beautifully written. I love the bold choice of telling the story from the second-person point of view; not many books I’ve read are like that, and the ones that are don’t do it well like this one does. I quickly fell in love with not only the writing style, but the characters as well. I had trouble putting it down.
That said, this was not a light read. With issues such as police brutality, racial trauma, and so on addressed, the poetic language acts as a device to drive in just how real these issues are, not to diminish these topics nor to demean the severity of them.
Overall, this was an amazing and show more important read. It’s one of the best books I’ve read in a while.
Completed for the 2021 Popsugar Reading Challenge; prompt #1—a book that’s published in 2021 show less
This is a beautifully written poetic story told about two black British artists that meet and immediately feel their connection. Their story is told in the 2nd person by the unnamed male character. As the story unfolds he describes in detail how their relationship goes from friendship to falling deeply in love. Through out this book he also describes the fear of being a black man in London and the injustice he witnesses around him. At times his fear will make him doubt himself and his relationship. The sadness and the realness of this book is extraordinary.
I enjoyed this book and his story telling. I loved all the music references and with his descriptive writing at times I felt like I had been transported to London. I found myself show more several times rereading lines or paragraphs to understand the emotions he was feeling. This is a book to savor and not rush through! show less
I enjoyed this book and his story telling. I loved all the music references and with his descriptive writing at times I felt like I had been transported to London. I found myself show more several times rereading lines or paragraphs to understand the emotions he was feeling. This is a book to savor and not rush through! show less
"You ache. You ache all over. You are aching to be you, but you're scared of what it means to do so."
The writing was fine and tended to repeat like a song chorus; music was a constant undercurrent. It felt very intimate. There was some nice quotables of the throes of new love. I liked the initial giddiness, but I never connected to the characters' relationship.
"You know that to love is both to swim and to drown. You know to love is to be a whole, partial, a joint, a fracture, a heart, a bone. It is to bleed and heal. It is to be in the world, honest."
The characters and situations are messy, but perfect characters are often boring. I don't think my issue was that it was a slow burn. But I lost interest around 60 pages in, as the pacing show more just seemed to go in a circle:
Friends that don't want to break the status quo but know they're feeling something between them. Girl is forward. Guy (you) reciprocates heavily. Girl gets skittish. Guy is left to withdraw but goes back when in need of emotional support. Friends reconnect. Feelings still hang heavy. Their connection was repetitive in the worst way. Either do something or keep it on the playground. I'm not mad that they broke up for a spell. He (you) needed to see a therapist at some point. your partner should be supportive always, but at some point, you also have to help yourself.
While the 2nd-person pov is unique, this story would work best as a movie or short film. The male lead (you) is emotional and emotionally repressed at the same time and has big feelings about love, grief, police brutality, Blackness, and love. (You're) he's a creative at heart and tries to find the words and ways to express himself.
2 stars show less
The writing was fine and tended to repeat like a song chorus; music was a constant undercurrent. It felt very intimate. There was some nice quotables of the throes of new love. I liked the initial giddiness, but I never connected to the characters' relationship.
"You know that to love is both to swim and to drown. You know to love is to be a whole, partial, a joint, a fracture, a heart, a bone. It is to bleed and heal. It is to be in the world, honest."
The characters and situations are messy, but perfect characters are often boring. I don't think my issue was that it was a slow burn. But I lost interest around 60 pages in, as the pacing show more just seemed to go in a circle:
Friends that don't want to break the status quo but know they're feeling something between them. Girl is forward. Guy (you) reciprocates heavily. Girl gets skittish. Guy is left to withdraw but goes back when in need of emotional support. Friends reconnect. Feelings still hang heavy. Their connection was repetitive in the worst way. Either do something or keep it on the playground.
While the 2nd-person pov is unique, this story would work best as a movie or short film. The male lead (you) is emotional and emotionally repressed at the same time and has big feelings about love, grief, police brutality, Blackness, and love. (You're) he's a creative at heart and tries to find the words and ways to express himself.
2 stars show less
I loved everything about this book. The writing is poetic/lyrical/sexy. It’s not just a love story, but the struggle of the main character and what it is be vulnerable and seen. I wish I could describe this book with the same beauty as it is written!
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Author Information
5 Works 1,075 Members
Some Editions
Awards and Honors
Awards
Distinctions
The Guardian Book of the Day (2021-02-19)
Common Knowledge
- Original publication date
- 2021-02-04
- Important places
- London, England, UK
- Epigraph
- There was an inevitability about their road towards on another which encourages meandering along the route.
Zadie Smith - Dedication
- For Es
- First words
- The barbershop was strangely quiet.
- Blurbers
- Gyasi, Yaa; Carty-Williams, Candice; Zephaniah, Benjamin; Evans, Diana; Shukla, Nikesh; Buchanan, Rowan Hisayo (show all 8); McMillan, Andrew; Babalola, Bolu
- Original language
- English
- Canonical DDC/MDS
- 823.92
Classifications
Statistics
- Members
- 865
- Popularity
- 31,247
- Reviews
- 19
- Rating
- (3.81)
- Languages
- 7 — Dutch, English, French, German, Polish, Portuguese, Spanish
- Media
- Paper, Audiobook, Ebook
- ISBNs
- 17
- ASINs
- 8
