Open Water follows two young people as they fall in love - from the beginning of the journey to the rocky, potential end of it. Told in second person, we follow from the male perspective as he explains what it's like to find your perfect match, to be Black and British, to be British and Ghanaian, to love the soul of a person while being scared for your own.

"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?"

This book is utter poetry, and I loved every second of it. It kept stunning me over, and over again with gorgeous descriptions of that perfect, thrilling feeling of falling in love with someone - the heady feeling of becoming obsessed about what makes a person who they are, of wanting to open your mouth and drink every bit of them up so you can understand their soul and they yours.

The love in this book is pure, and powerful, and not completely perfect. Perfect in its imperfections but what I loved the most was this precious glimpse into the mind and life of a young Black man, struggling with his pride in who he was, and where he came from but also the fear for his life every time he walked out the door.

I think I have read books from BIPOC characters or authors mostly focused on the female perspective which I love, but I really felt it special to see the character's joys and fears spilled out on the pages in this one. His utter rage at what he is made to feel like, how he is treated. He is a gentle, creative soul yet because of the colour of his skin, is often made to feel like a criminal because of the authorities. And if it's not the police he's afraid of, he also has to be way of knife crime and gang crime in London, issues which also disproportionately affect young Black men.

The character's struggle to be vulnerable; to not show his fears to the girl who loves him most is so hard to read, and the fight to understand between the two of them as well is tough. The silent battle to have someone know what you are going through without having to say it and lay all your vulnerabilities on the table. To not be the "strong, Black man" society assumes you to be.

"You don't know why you're crying. Sometimes, love aches. You're not sad but bowled over."

The only reason why I didn't give this the full 5 stars as I felt at times the character would wander off with his thoughts, and my own mind would stray a bit - not fully committed to the page. But the beauty of this book struck me again, and again and I can't recommend it enough!