Contemporary Fiction/Classics

Blurb:

A stunning, shattering debut novel about two Black artists falling in and out of love

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.

Review:

Open Water follows a young black man and black woman in their 20s who meet at a pub and fall in love. The man is a photographer in London, and the woman is a dancer based out of Dublin. Interestingly, the entire story is told in snippets — in tiny snapshots of life — so we’re not following the events chronologically. Additionally, it’s recounted in a second-person point of view, which lends a sense of present time to the narration, though to me, I tend to find second-person narration is a tad jarring.

The story is told from the male’s point of view and starts by focusing on their relationship — how they meet, their initial awkwardness, getting to know each other, him wanting more than friendship, and how they make the leap from friends to lovers. We never learn our characters’ names — they are only referred to as “you” and “she/her.” I found it refreshing to read a story about love told from the male’s perspective, including all of his doubts, fears, excitement, and vulnerability.

But in addition to focusing on the relationship between these two young people, the book also looks at what it’s like to be young, black, and in your 20’s in London. There’s a lot of discussion about racial profiling, the mistreatment of young black men by the police, and how criminality is always assumed merely because of skin color. The book was raw and heart-wrenching in places, as the author describes in detail how time and time again, unsuspecting black men are thrown to the ground, knee on the back, and interrogated. We really got a feeling of how overwhelmingly exhausting, frightening, and risky it can be even to leave the house when the constant threat of assumed criminality is always there. I could feel the author really captured well the main character’s weariness at being constantly marginalized.

Though the story is written in prose, it almost felt as though I were reading verse as it was so beautiful and so lyrical. Through the lush, ethereal prose, the author captures and brings forth several powerful themes such as marginalization, fear, vulnerability, being seen vs. being unseen, racism, microaggression, brutality, dating, and young love.

A wise and painful book, Open Water is a deeply moving and poignant character-driven story that speaks to the times that we live in. Additionally, the visceral style of writing and breathtaking metaphors really captured the emotion and tenderness between the couple. It’s unsettling and troubling and yet strangely beautiful at the same time — a very different kind of love story.

A huge thank you to Netgalley and Grove Atlantic for providing a review copy of this book.

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First off, let me start by saying that I love the film “Groundhog Day,” so the synopsis of this story caught my attention right away, so I ordered it. It was actually December’s Book of the Month Club pick.

So “In a Holidaze” is a time-travel Christmas romance and the story starts on out December 26th. We follow a somewhat disenchanted woman named Maelyn, who has just spent the Christmas holidays with her family at a cabin in Utah with two other families, a tradition that they’ve all done since before she was born. She’s embarrassed, and maybe just a little bit humiliated because, over the holiday, she made a super-embarrassing romantic mistake. Not only that, she hates her job, is living with her parents, and has just learned that this was the last Christmas they all would be spending at the beloved cabin because the owners plan on selling it. As she broods over her life, she makes a wish to the universe: “Please show me what will make me happy.”

Her parents’ car then collides with another vehicle, and everything goes black. When she wakes up, it’s December 21st again, and she’s on an airplane bound for Utah to begin the holiday trip once again. This happens several times — she blacks out and wakes up back on the plane on December 21st, heading to Utah. So now she has to figure out what she needs to do to break this Groundhog Day-style time loop that she’s caught in. It just might have something to do with one of the two handsome brothers, Andrew and Theo Hollis, who share the cabin with her and her family and both of whom she’s known all her life. One brother is the recipient of her long-time secret crush, which she’s harbored for years, and the other is a cherished friend and just may have a crush on her.

Each time she gets sent back, she makes different choices, but as she learns, if she makes one mistake, one misstep, she had to do it all over again. Eventually, she figures out that if she ever wants to escape the loop, she just might have to overcome her fears and do that which frightens her the most.

This was a super fun, fluffy, heart-warming story, and I loved how the author used the time-loop as a plot device. It worked really well in this story. I also loved the nostalgic aspect of this story about holiday traditions, a dual-family vacation, complete with snowball fights, snow sculpture contests, playing games, stolen kisses, and eggnog.

There was also plenty of humor and a fantastic cast of characters. All of the other family and friends in the story were so endearing, with each person playing an essential element in the narrative — though I was especially fond of her family friend, Benny, who helped steer our protagonist in the right direction and who was the only one who knew what was really going on with Mae. I also enjoyed how she started to avoid the little disasters and mistakes that she knew were coming and figured that if she can prevent the little ones, she should be able to avoid the big ones too. Right?

And at the end, Mae receives an answer to her question and learns exactly what it is that will make her happy.

All in all, I found In a Holidaze to be a lovely, emotional, heartfelt Christmas romance with an intriguing plot about finding the courage to pursue one’s happiness. This playful story is ideal for anyone looking for a fast and breezy low-angst tale with plenty of holiday cheer and a big heart.

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Giovanni’s Room is a tragic classic gay literary novel written in 1956 and is quite a courageous novel for its time. The story takes place in Paris in the 1950s and follows an American man named David, who is desperately trying to suppress his sexuality and deal with his internalized homophobia.

He has a fiancé named Hella, who is off traveling in Spain. While in Paris, David begins a love affair with a handsome and passionate Italian bartender named Giovanni. He ends living with him in “Giovanni’s room,” leading to a catastrophic turn of events, mainly due to David’s inability to acknowledge or accept his true feelings for Giovanni.

David, the narrator of the story, is an extremely unlikeable character: he’s selfish, dishonest, cruel, extremely judgmental, self-loathing, self-deprecating, and feels next to nothing when he hurts those who love him. He hates himself and seems to hate anyone who cares for him, and though he claims to be happy at times, there is a shadow hanging over him, a claustrophobic feeling of despair. Yet, you can’t help but relate to him on some level, especially the shame and regret he experiences.

So what we have is a broken and complex young man struggling with his sexuality and the love triangle which he has created, creating a sort of self-made prison. Though David is mostly an unlikeable protagonist, your heart still breaks for him because of his deep self-loathing and shame, which seem to crush him and both of which, unfortunately, win out in this story leading to pain and loneliness, and terrible tragedy.

Yes, it is a grim, draining, and heart-wrenching story. Still, there are so many compelling messages and metaphors within the pages, all expressed in Baldwin’s beautiful and mesmerizing prose, almost like music. The incisive writing itself swept me away. Though it’s a short novel — coming in at only around 150 pages — it is as hauntingly beautiful as it is evocative and packs an all-mighty emotional punch in such a short span of pages.

Giovanni’s Room is an honest exploration of identity and sexuality and perhaps a reminder that love needs to be open, free, and without shame. This story was a clear example of how, when love has shame and guilt at its core, that love can quickly turn to hatred.

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This is an unconventional rom-con that follows Minnie Cooper (and yes, that is her real name), who meets Quinn Hamilton at a New Year’s Eve party after Minnie ends up getting locked in a bathroom the entire night. After talking, they realize that they are somewhat kindred spirits in that they were both born thirty years prior, only a couple of minutes apart, in the same hospital on New Year’s Eve. In fact, their mothers met and the hospital and, as it turns out, there’s a bit of bad blood between the two of them. We learn the reason for this at the beginning of the story.

Apart from being born on the same day/same place, Minnie and Quinn couldn’t be more different. Quinn is being a wealthy (though charming) party-boy with commitment issues and Minnie being a hard-working, somewhat insecure business owner/chef who’s just barely getting by. It’s also worth mentioning that Minnie considers herself jinxed because horrible things nearly always happen to her on her birthday. For instance, during the year in which the main narrative occurs, she ends up locked in her bathroom all night long, and later that day loses her apartment. Thus, she tends to stay at home and hide on New Years’s Eve/New Year’s Day.

The story is told via several different timelines, and as we move through the story, we see how Minnie and Quinn are continuously brought together, often without them even realizing it or being aware of it. For instance, some of these strange parallels involve their paths crossing several times during their childhood and teenage years, though they never officially met each other.

As the narrative progresses, which is told through both of their POVs, we also learn the backstory of their mothers, an essential element of the plotline, which I found fascinating. I also enjoyed how Minnie and Quinn change their views of each other once they begin spending some time together; so in this way, they learn not to judge a book by its cover.

This novel consists of so many more layers than merely being a love story. It’s also about family dynamics, the bonds of friendship, self-esteem, emotional baggage, mental health, and following your dreams. But what really made this novel for me were the brilliant and engaging secondary characters, each of whom added depth and feeling to the story. Not only were they complex and well-drawn, but also authentic, quirky, somewhat eccentric, and utterly loyal. The author lured me in with Quinn and Minnie’s compelling story and snappy dialog, then hooked me with the endearing and captivating characters.

All in all, this This Time Next Year is an enjoyable and satisfying read.

Purchase This Time Next Year from The Book Depository.

Purchase This Time Next Year from The Book Depository