A review by _abii__
Open Water by Caleb Azumah Nelson

challenging emotional inspiring reflective fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

Open Water is a book about what it feels to love, what it means to be honest with your partner, to share experiences, to achieve freedom. It deals with Blackness and how it can be beautiful and exquisite, but also sufocating and burdensome. All of this is told from second pov. 

Going into this i thought it was simply a love story, two people knowing each other intimately, learning to love. From the prologue alone I could tell this was going to be a different kind of love story. This book gives so much more. It details the pleasures in the small things such as music and photography and literature and how each of them have the power to impact our lives. 

"You’re like a pair of jazz musicians, forever improvising. Or perhaps you are not musicians, but your love manifests in the music. Sometimes, your head tucked into her neck, you can feel her heartbeat thudding like a kick drum. Your smile a grand piano, the glint in her eye like the twinkle of hands caressing ivory keys. The rhythmic strum of a double bass the inert grace she has been blessed with, moving her body in ways which astound. A pair of soloists in conversations so harmonious, one struggles to separate. You are not the musicians but the music."

Without art forms culture is dead and without culture we, as a society, as humans, are dead.
 
The novel goes on a path to correlate these things, the multiple references from musicians and writers help to sustain the main character’s background story, and where he stands in life. It controls and shapes his thinking and his morals and sometimes even how he interprets the situations in his life.
 
"You have been going and going and going and now you have decided to slow down, to a halt, and confess. You are scared."

At first I was hesitant due to it being narrated in second pov, but there was no need for it. This book uses this narrative device extremelly well, the best i’ve read. It uses it in a way that reaches the reader and takes you into the narrative, into the experiences of the main character. You are able to immerse yourself in the story and feel it.
 
The prose is astonishingly beautiful and sometimes too clever and pretty for me to understand. It is not linear, it jumps throughout space, grasping concepts isntead of plot. And while it works for most of the novel, at times it felt to abstract to comprehend. Sometimes it needed to be more specific and concise intead of the endless ramblings that, while beautiful, can leave the reader a bit lost.
 
“Besides, sometimes, to resolve desire, it’s better to let the thing bloom. To feel this thing, to let it catch you unaware, to hold onto the ache. What is better than believing you are heading towards love?”

This at least has given us some gorgeous quotes.
 
Nelson writes characters that are inherently human, they love, they hate, they fear, they mistrust, they’re selfish, they’re selfless, they cry and they fight. All of that adds up to dazzling characters. 

While the love story is the main point in this book I would like to point out two another relationships that captivated my attention. 

"This is your brother, your charge, your duty, your son."

Mayhaps this made me weep. Siblings relationships are something so fulcral to one’s being and fundemental to one’s growth. The bond between siblings goes deeper than many people take notice, you raise them and then they comfort you as you go through breakups, and a love is forged, a connection is made that can never be broken. A love and understanding that is so uniquely yours that outsiders will always be estranged to it no matter how hard you try to explain. You love your sibling so fiercely, but they’re also the person you fight with the most. Nelson was able to capture this in ten words, a setence.
 
"No one has bars harder than your mum as she prays for you every day that this will not be the day."

Black mothers go through a certain pain that I can’t even begin to understand. Nelson describes it better than I ever could.
 
"You realize there is a reason clichés exist, and you would happily have your breath taken away, three seconds at a time, maybe more, by this woman."

The relationship between our two characters is so tender, so precious but also so fragile and heartbreaking. They understand each other, they know who they are at their core and become a little codependent. However, not in a way that they don’t have space for development, but in a way that incentives that self growth.
 
Vulnerability is a big theme across this book, and our main character learns how to deal with it. He battles a lot with the question of whether vulnerability is connected to love and what can it mean in a relationship. It also explores how the black experience with police brutality can affect your relationship with your loved ones. Should you be vulnerable about subjects that also affect your partner on a personal level, that being honest with them about how you feel could bring up their own trauma? These are questions Open Water seeks to answer.
 
The scenes where police brutality is explored are quite descriptive and graphic so be aware of that.
 
In conclusion i enjoyed this book for its beutiful prose as well as for the love story between the main characters. It tackles interesting topics about the human condition and what it means to enjoy life. While still providing insightful social commentary. 
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