Open Water is British-Ghanian writer Caleb Azumah Nelson’s debut novel. It’s about two young black artists who fall in love in London. At the heart of the story it is a love song to the young black man’s soul. It is narrated by the male protagonist. He is the voice of the story throughout the book. In a world that portrays black men as violent or unfeeling, as skins’ made of steel so that they’re constantly being cut open just to see if they bleed, this was a welcome truth. Even though the story is set in London and Dublin, it might as well be America, or any other part of the world where black men are targets more than humans.
The narrator is sweet and young. The story is beautifully written, like poetry and you, the reader get to see the protagonist’s heart. As a black woman I wanted to experience the protagonist’s lover’s side of the story as well as his own. How was she feeling? How did the constant weight of the potential violence against her lover by those meant to protect him affect her? But I realized that the author was trying to tell the young black man’s experience.
This story belongs to all black men and only them. Everyone else makes an appearance.
What I Liked About it: You know when you are really good friends with someone and you can see that both of you want to be more than friends and you act like more than friends? Both of you act until you can’t act anymore and you have to call it and either date or not. I liked going along for the ride and experiencing the tension of falling in love with your friend along with the protagonist. I also loved the way the author portrayed a young man consumed with love. I loved the relationship the protagonist had with his brother.
Favourite Line(s)/phrases: There are so many. This book is a book of poetry. I’ll give you two because there are too many to choose from.
This is how you die. This is how young boys die. This is how your mothers and partners and sisters and daughters die too. The grief makes them tired. The effort makes them tired. This living is precarious and could make light work of your life at anytime. There’s a nudge at your elbow, a young man offering small hazy fire between finger and thumb. Eyes crackle red with each soft gulp until pupils turn wide and Black. Slow down. Take pleasure. Your hands around her waist, small fire in palm, eyes ablaze. Loosen up, she says, and your hips break like the language. No need for mimicry. Miserly grey of a London sky on Carnival Monday, muggy heat stalling on bare back as you danced the day away with a stranger.
Read if: You love poetry. You love romance and the slow burn of falling in love. You want to understand the tight spaces black men have to fit in to survive and the scars learning to survive in those tight spaces leave in their wake.
Moyo Laditan 