Black Bear announced today that their management arm has signed author, writer, photographer and filmmaker Caleb Azumah Nelson for representation. He is best known for his debut novel Open Water, which the BBC is adapting into a series, with Nelson set to write and direct.

Published in 2021, Open Water has earned widespread acclaim, including the Costa First Novel Award in 2021, a longlisting for the Desmond Elliot and Gordon Burn prizes, and shortlisting for the Waterstones Book of the Year 2021. The novel was named the Booksellers Association Fiction Book of the Month in February 2021 and Waterstones Paperback of the Month in February 2022. It also won Debut Fiction Book of the Year at the British Book Awards in 2022 and was longlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize the same year.

Nelson has garnered much recognition for his talents. In 2020, he was awarded the Palm Photo People’s Choice prize for his photography and was shortlisted for the BBC National Short Story Award for his story Pray, which he later adapted into a short film for B-Side Productions and BBC Films. Pray was directed by Nelson and stars David Jonsson (“Industry”) and had its world premiere at the prestigious Locarno Film Festival in 2023. Additionally, he was named one of the Observer’s 10 Best Debut Novelists of 2021 and honored as a National Book Foundation 5 Under 35 recipient the same year. In April 2024, Caleb was selected for the inaugural Sunday Times Young Power List, named one of the ’25 most inspiring people aged 30 and under in the UK and Ireland 2024′.

In 2023, Nelson published his second novel, Small Worlds, receiving praise for his unique melodic prose. Intimacies author Katie Kitamura referred to Nelson’s writing in the coming of age novel as “unmatched in its musicality and sensitivity”. This past year, Small Worlds was longlisted for the Jhalak Prize and won the Dylan Thomas Prize and was recently optioned for the screen, with Nelson set to direct.