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Two young people meet at a pub in south east London. Both are Black British, both are artists – he, a photographer, she a dancer. Set to the insistent rhythms of the contemporary city, their friendship blossoms and grows into something closer as they try to find their own space in a society that by turns celebrates and rejects them.

A tender, tentative love story, Open Water is also an exploration of Black British experience, an unforgettable insight into race, identity and masculinity. It describes in lyrical, fierce, touching detail what it is to be a young Black Londoner: the daily exhaustion and trauma of racism, the richness and joy of shared music, the struggle to be seen as an individual, and above all the vulnerability, elation and heartache of falling in love.

Open Water won the 2021 Costa First Novel Award. Caleb Azumah Nelson is a British-Ghanaian writer and photographer living in south east London. He was shortlisted for the Â鶹ԼÅÄ National Short Story Prize in 2020, and won the People's Choice prize in the Palm Photo Awards. His second novel, Small Worlds, will be out in May 2023.

Photo of Caleb Azumah Nelson

Abridged and produced by Sara Davies
Read by Michael Amariah
Edited and mixed by Iain Hunter
A Pier Production for Â鶹ԼÅÄ Radio 4