Caleb Azumah Nelson

A stunning, shattering debut novel about two Black British artists falling in and out of love - available for pre-order now 'A love song to black art and thought, an exploration of intimacy and vulnerability between two young artists learning to be soft with each other in a world that hardens against black people.' Yaa Gyasi, bestselling author of HOMEGOING Two young people meet at a pub in South East London. 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 - trying to make their mark in a city 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. At once an achingly beautiful love story and a potent insight into race and masculinity, Open Water 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, Caleb Azumah Nelson has written the most essential debut of recent years. 'An amazing debut novel. You should read this book. Let's hear it for Caleb Azumah Nelson, also known as the future' Benjamin Zephaniah 'A beautiful and powerful novel about the true and sometimes painful depths of love' Candice Carty-Williams, Sunday Times bestselling author of QUEENIE 'Caleb is a star in the making.' Nikesh Shukla, editor of THE GOOD IMMIGRANT 'A stunning piece of art' Bolu Babalola, Sunday Times bestselling author of LOVE IN COLOUR

Open Water

maría 🪻

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. It is to place someone next to your beating heart, in the absolute darkness of your inner, and trust they will hold you close. To love is to trust, to trust is to have faith. How else are you meant to love? 

Luna 🌙

Ausrine Blazyte

Maisha Prather

Victoria Justice

Giovanna da Custodia

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. So here you are, drowning.

deniz

When the mind is lost in ecstasy, there is no condition for self-reflection, self-questioning. 

echo

You feel you have never been strangers. You do not want to leave each other, because to leave is to have the thing die in its current form and there is something, something in this that neither is willing to relinquish.

sofia mae

Let's ask: which came first, the violence or the pain? 

There's no solace in the shade. Let yourself be heard and hear her words. Have faith. Suck at the snake's bite, spit out the venom at your feet. Gaze at the fading scar but do not dwell. Do not hide but do not dwell. There's no solace in the shade. Let your- self be heard and hear her words. Have faith. 

lara

The songs are full of nostalgia, which is to say they are full of mourning; one remembers that which came before, often with a fond sadness, a want to return, despite knowing to return to a memory is to morph it, to warp it. Every time you remember something, the memory weakens, as you're remembering the last recollection, rather than the memory itself. Nothing can remain intact. Still, it does not stop you from wanting, does not stop you longing.

Rebecca Lum

Arie P

Perhaps that is how we should frame this question forever; rather than asking what is your favourite work, let's ask, what continues to pull you back?

Open Water quotes

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