Finding stillness in ‘Being Water’

Shazia Omar’s Being Water is a deeply introspective novel about grief, trauma, and the slow, often painful journey towards healing. Soon to be published by Om Books International, the book explores the ‘low hum’ of repressed trauma and the exhausting effort of maintaining a functional facade in the wake of tragedy.

The narrative centres Nora, a 29 year-old corporate litigation lawyer from London. Suffocating under the relentless weight of 14-hour billable workdays, Nora embarks on a month-long sacred exile in a secluded, bougainvillea-framed villa near Galle, Sri Lanka, in a desperate bid to find stillness. Her plans to travel with her lifelong best friend, Beth, are abruptly toppled by Beth’s sudden pregnancy. In Beth’s stead arrives Mel, Beth’s “impossibly 21 year-old” American cousin, who is armed with a bright, relentless “polka dot optimism” and an eagerness to fill her very first passport.

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The book utilises a cynical, defensive, first-person narrative voice that constantly struggles to maintain a composed facade while being bombarded by fragmented memories. Water and ocean currents are used as central metaphors.

For the highly guarded, cynical Nora, Mel’s unjaded enthusiasm is initially exhausting. To Nora, Sri Lanka is not a tropical paradise, but a “Ghost Land” where her deeply buried family secrets are waiting to be exhumed. The story moves on to address a tragedy, one which was inflicted on her family that left a gaping wound in her soul. The family tragedy fractured her home, tore apart her parents’ marriage, and left a visibly empty life for Nora to fill. Since then, Nora has lived inside a “fortress built on self-loathing,” using work and alcohol to numb her pain.

Shazia Omar—a yoga teacher for over 25 years, and the founder of the global wellness retreat platform “The Flow Fest”, weaves into the narrative what she knows best. Omar’s narrative beautifully mirrors her background in mindfulness, weaving Eastern philosophy and somatic healing into Nora’s journey. At a local wellness sanctuary called “Grow,” Asanka, an intuitive Ayurvedic practitioner, diagnoses Nora as “fire” and warns that she needs “more water” and forgiveness to heal. This spiritual directive is physically tested when Nora reluctantly takes surfing lessons from Fish, a local instructor. Tumbling repeatedly through the waves, Nora finally surrenders to the current, experiencing a fleeting moment of peace where a tight “clamp” is lifted from her breastbone.

The island also introduces Parker, a quiet, grounded Australian medical practitioner working with refugees. Parker carries his own “ocean trench” of trauma, having served in Sri Lanka during the final phases of the civil war, where he lost a close friend. Unlike others, Parker does not flinch at Nora’s pain, offering her a non-judgmental space that gradually coaxes her out of her shell.

Omar’s writing style is highly sensory, and deeply introspective. Drawing on her background as a long-time yoga teacher, the prose frequently focuses on physical sensations—like a tightness under the ribs, a clamp on the breastbone, and the rhythm of breath—to map Nora’s psychological state. The book utilises a cynical, defensive, first-person narrative voice that constantly struggles to maintain a composed facade while being bombarded by fragmented memories. Water and ocean currents are used as central metaphors for grief, surrender, and change. The prose uses a rich texture of references, including how Virginia Woolf attempted to drown herself by filling up her pockets with stones. Omar parallels the ‘tortured artist’ Woolf with Nora, along with a cheeky comment on how Sita was held captive in Lanka. Nora’s beautiful stream of consciousness peaks out when she reminisces—”Ma used to say that Lanka is where Sita was held prisoner, not by chains but by the ocean itself.”

In Being Water, Shazia Omar has crafted a lyrical, deeply moving exploration of what it means to live in the aftermath of tragedy. It is a story that understands that the self who existed before a loss is forever gone, but that “a broken heart can become a wider door for love.” This is a raw, evocative, and ultimately hopeful novel about learning to breathe around the holes left by grief.

Tasnim Naz is an academician of English Literature at Bangladesh University of Professionals. Her research interests are feminism, ecofeminist studies, and postcolonial studies. Reach her at tasnimnaz46@gmail.com.